Skip to Main Content
NAU Cline Library logo

Indigenous Environmental Justice

Holder

Environmental Justice: Environmental justice is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income, with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies.

Environmental Justice refers to those cultural norms and values, rules, regulations, behaviors, policies, and decisions to support sustainability, where all people can hold with confidence that their community and natural environment is safe and productive.

Environmental Racism: Whether, by conscious design or institutional neglect, actions and decisions that result in the disproportionate exposure of people of color to environmental hazards and environmental health burdens.

Environmental Racism refers to the institutional rules, regulations, policies or government and/or corporate decisions that deliberately target certain communities for locally undesirable land uses and lax enforcement of zoning and environmental laws, resulting in communities being disproportionately exposed to toxic and hazardous waste based upon race.
                                                                                                                                                                               Taken from NCCJ and Greenaction

Terms to consider:

  • Uranium (or other term) and Navajo
  • Native American
  • environmental
  • environmental justice
  •  environmental injustice
  • environmental racism
  • environmental inequality

Websites of Interest

Indian Law Resources Related to Environment & Climate Change
Collection of sources from the National Indian Law Library 

Enduring Legacies: Native Case Studies
The Enduring Legacies Native Cases Initiative develops culturally relevant curriculum and teaching resources in the form of case studies on key issues in Indian Country.

Environmental Justice for Tribes and Indigenous Peoples [U.S. EPA]
The Environmental Protection Agency works with indigenous groups and members in Indian country

American Indian Environmental Office Tribal Portal

American Indian Environmental Office

U.S. Department of the Interior Indian Affairs Office of Justice Services

Environmental Justice : A compilation of resources by the U.S. Department of Transportation. 

EPA : Environmental Justice : Environmental Justice is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. EPA has this goal for all communities and persons across this Nation. It will be achieved when everyone enjoys the same degree of protection from environmental and health hazards and equal access to the decision-making process to have a healthy environment in which to live, learn, and work

Environmental Health News 

EJView : An environmental justice geographic assessment online mapping tool to locate facilities by a city, county, state, ZIP code, watershed, EPA region, latitude/longitude, facility or address. 

EnviroLink's Environmental Justice

earthJustice

Environmental Defense Fund : Environmental Defense is dedicated to protecting the environmental rights of all people, including future generations. Among these rights are clean air and water, healthy and nourishing food, and a flourishing ecosystem. The site provides an extensive collection of online publications on biodiversity, environmental justice, climate change, health, and oceans. These publications include reports, testimony, factsheets, educational materials, letters, newsletters and a complete catalog of publications.
Water Resources of the United State

Water: Science and Technology

CDC Water Related Research