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The goal of Michigan: A State of Environmental Justice? is to free us from an economic growth and development paradigm that threatens our social and physical well-being. While we accumulate wealth, we also accumulate harmful pollution and environmental waste. The challenge is to implement a new economic growth and development paradigm that is more environmentally benign and socially responsible and economically productive.
List of contents
Chapter 1: Environmental Justice: Overview
Chapter 2: Environmental Awareness, Hazardous Waste, and the Disproportionate Impact on Low-income Communities and Communities of Color
Chapter 3: Methods and Issues
Chapter 4: Hazardous Wastes and Spatial Relations According to Race and Income in the State of Michigan
Chapter 5: Environmental Justice and the Latino Community
Chapter 6: A Comparative Analysis of Flint Area Zip Codes: Evidence of One Community’s Disproportionate Burden of Environmental Hazards
Chapter 7: A Case Study: The Controversy Between Environmental Disposal Systems and Residents of the City of Romulus, Michigan Over the Siting of a Deep Injection Well on Wahrman Road
Chapter 8: The Greater Detroit Resource Recovery Facility
Chapter 9: The Multifaceted Nature of Pollution, Environmental Cleanup and Issues of Disparate Impact and Health
Chapter 11:Jobs and Economic Growth v. Environmental Protection Debate
Chapter 12: Berlin & Farro: Perhaps Michigan’s Worst Toxic Disposal Site
About the author
Bunyan I. Bryant Jr. is a Professor Emeritus at the University of Michigan. In 1972, he became the first African American member of the School for Environment and Sustainability faculty at Michigan. He is considered a pioneer in the field of environmental justice.In 1990, Bryant organized the first Michigan Conference on Race and the Incidence of Environmental Hazards and with several other prominent attendees formed what came to be known as the Michigan Coalition. Their advocacy efforts helped lead to the creation of the EPA's Work Group on Environmental Equity. With Paul Mohai, Bryant co-published Race and the Incidence of Environmental Hazards (1993), which was one of the first major scholarly books to explore the links between race, class, and environmental hazards. Bryant also established an environmental justice program at the University of Michigan which was the first in the country to offer undergraduate and graduate degrees in the specialty.Bryant's work has been recognized with numerous academic and other honors, including the Environmental Justice Champion Award at the Flint Environmental Justice Summit on March 10, 2017.
Summary
Michigan: A State of Environmental Justice? focuses attention on the byproducts of growth and development in the state of Michigan and describes who wins and who loses. Over the years while growth and development have been good for some, it has been devastating for others; the byproducts of growth and development have threatened the lives of people who breathe polluted air, who are exposed to contaminated water, and whose children play on polluted soil. People affected by toxins must organize to protect themselves, their families, and their communities from environmental harm.
Let us be clear right from the beginning. We are not against economic growth and development; we are against certain kinds of economic growth and development--i.e., growth and development that expose people to unnecessary harm. We feel it is possible to have economic growth and development with environmental protection. All of this is explored in Michigan: A State of Environmental Justice?
