ENVIRONMENT AND TECHNOLOGY
2011
Erin E. Robinson*
Canisius College
The Environment and Technology Division strives to encourage research and discussion about societal impacts of issues in environment and technology. Our division sponsors paper sessions across a range of subfields of sociology and the environment, including, but not limited to political economy of the environment, social movements and the environment, animals and the environment, technology and society, natural disasters and society, risk and risk perception.
As a division, we serve to support research that extends an understanding of social causes and impacts on social institutions that extend from environmental and technological concerns. We strive to advance the causes of social justice by directing attention to the unjust social consequences of environmental problems. Socio-economic status and other quality of life indicators become indicators of environmental pollution as well. Often times, poor and minority individuals suffer the burden of environmental pollution, while those in higher socioeconomic statuses are able to avoid such consequences. Our division works to understand the institutional causes and consequences of such disparities and work towards producing research that advances the literature in these areas.
Additionally, we seek to understand science and its limits surrounding conclusive evidence between exposure and illness. For example, it makes sense to focus on the basic needs that provide individuals with a strong quality of life. Arguably, if someone’s quality of life is impacted, but the exposures do not fall within the deemed statistical significance necessary for the state to act, should consideration still be given to their right to pursue life in a clean, healthy environment? Essentially, the issues become issues of human rights and justice.
Environmental sociology and related areas of study have developed into a substantial field of literature since the 1970s. We seek to consistently address the findings in the literature from this field and offer engaging dialogue that seeks to advance the study of environment and society. From political economy of the environment introduced in seminal works, such as The Environment from Surplus to Scarcity (Schnaiberg 1980) to the social constructionist work of John Hannigan in Environmental Sociology: A Social Constructionist Perspective (1995), literature rich in theoretical and empirical findings continues to challenge assumptions made about the social world. Our division serves as a space for these discussions to be held.
SSSP members are drawn to this organization in part because of its historical focus on issues of social justice. We are interested in applying critical scientific perspectives to the basic study of society that affects us all. In concert with that, members of the Environment and Technology Division seek engage in research in order to explore and analysis a root cause of social injustice—environmental issues. Environmental issues are fundamentally issues of social justice. Inherent to these issues are issues of health and illness, issues of economics, issues of race, class, and gender, and issues of colonial exploitation. As we continue to advance as a society in late modernity, we will evermore have the need to explore and understand the consequences on society and environment of such forms of development such as a globalization, neoliberalism, and advanced capitalism.
Further Reading:
Bullard, Robert D. 1990. Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class and Environmental Quality. Westview: Boulder, CO.
Bullard, Robert D. (Ed). 1993. Environmental Racism: Voices from the Grassroots. Boston: South End.
Cable, Sherry and Charles Cable. 1995. Environmental Problems/Grassroots Solutions: The Politics of Environmental Conflict. New York: St. Martin’s Press.
Capek, Stella M. 1993. “The ‘Environmental Justice’ Frame: A Conceptual Discussion and an Application.” Social Problems 40:5-24.
Dunlap, Riley E. 1997. “The Evolution of Environmental Sociology.” Pp. 21-39 in M. Redclift and G. Woodgate (eds.), The International Handbook of Environmental Sociology. Chelterham, UK: Edward Elgar.
Gunter, Valerie and Steve Kroll-Smith (eds). 2006. Volatile Places: A Sociology of Communities and Environmental Controversies. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press.
Hannigan, John A. 1995. Environmental Sociology: A Social Constructionist Perspective. London: Routledge.
Humphrey, Craig R., Tammy L. Lewis and Frederick H. Buttel. 2002. Environment, Energy, and Society: A New Synthesis. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Kroll-Smith, Steve, Phil Brown, and Valerie J. Gunter. 2000. Illness and the Environment: A Reader in Contested Medicine. New York, NY: New York University Press.
Marshall, Brent. 1999. “Globalization, Environmental Degradation, and Ulrich Beck’s Risk Society.” Environmental Values 8:253-275.
Pellow, David Naguib and Robert J. Brulle (eds.). 2005. Power, Justice, and the Environment: A Critical Appraisal of the Environmental Justice Movement. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Redclift, Michael and Graham Woodgate (eds.). 1997. The International Handbook of Environmental Sociology. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar.
Schnaiberg, Allan 1980. The Environment: From Surplus to Scarcity. New York: Oxford University Press.
Szasz, Andrew. 1994. EcoPopulism: Toxic Waste and the Movement for Environmental Justice. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
York, Richard. 2004. “The Treadmill of (Diversifying) Production.” Organization & Environment 17:355-362.
