20.5.08

The burning question

I keep wondering about the broad-spectrum goals of my organization, and the environmental justice movement in general. I'm going to start accosting folks around the office with this question:

Are policy changes the true ultimate tangible accomplishment we are working so hard to achieve?

My bias is this: It's a little less than believable to me that policy changes alone will accomplish the sociocultural changes needed to truly prevent harm that's perpetrated by chemical factories and a waste industry so focused on profitability that they don't even factor in life cycle and the effects on human health before something bad happens. But then what do caring folks work toward after those policy changes are or are not achieved?

We'll see what responses I get.

9 comments:

Riva said...

hey Caitlin, it's Riva.

My general thought on this issue is that even if the legislation isn't sufficient, it's necessary. While some choices fall into the realm of individual responsibility (eating vegetarian, line-drying laundry, biking to work), some things just can't be accomplished on an individual scale, like zoning cities and designing roads that make it safer and more practical for people to bike to work.

I'm also pretty optimistic about the power of changing laws to change social mores in the following decades. Sometimes when there's a progressive idea, like school integration during the civil rights movement, it can be more effective to get it done with legislation and let the culture adapt to it than to wait for the cultural changes to happen on their own (because maybe they won't) before legislating it.

My one concern with lobbying organizations (and I interned with MaryPIRG/Environment Maryland in high school for my senior project) is that I wonder how good their track record is for really changing legislation. What if we went to work in government directly?

Caitlin said...

I've wondered, too, about going to work directly in the institute that needs a change. For me, I have considered that working within a company that has a traditional way of practicing engineering, the focus of my college studies, might be a good way to expose those folks to the idea of doing something another way.

The idea of working in government has also occurred - I could work in the EPA! - but the things I hear about government work, both from the uncaring abuses by employees of the generous benefits program, to the egregious manipulation of laws to suit corporate funders, turns me off too much to really make that option too appealing.

I am not one to subvert work from within - I would rather be a part of a formally opposed movement, just for my own peace of mind. I don't really have many thoughts on which one might work better/quicker/more effectively, because it's hard to judge that objectively. Though there are some cool stories about government whistle-blowers. Check this one out:
http://pwp.lincs.net/sanjour/

I can't imagine there's much job security in that, though.

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