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While risk assessment continues to drive most environmental management decision-making, its methods and assumptions have been criticized for, among other things, perpetuating environmental injustice. The justice challenges to risk assessment claim that the process ignores the unique and multiple hazards facing low-income and people of color communi...
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... LEK may be particularly valuable in relation to understanding and managing ephemeral wetlands located in remote areas where comprehensive scientific data collection may be impractical (Barsh 1997;Ferguson et al. 1998). Local knowledge as an information source needs to be taken into consideration in conservation plans and management decisions (Corburn 2002). An increasing number of researchers have paid attention to LEK and have emphasised the significance of LEK in various ecological and environmental studies (Davis 2005;Isaac et al. 2009;Mamun 2010;D'Antonio et al. 2012;Joa et al. 2018;Sousa et al. 2020). ...
Ephemeral wetlands are important ecologically but are often jurisdictionally complex and under-studied. Forms of local knowledge, including local ecological knowledge (LEK) and farmer knowledge, are increasingly recognised as able to complement other scientific knowledge for planning and management. This paper contributes to the discussion on the value and potential use of local knowledge by considering the Cowal system, an ephemeral wetland in dryland Australia. The Cowal system’s hydrological regime is highly variable, with drying and wetting cycles influenced by distant rainfall events. There is limited historical scientific data available for the system. Semi-structured interviews were undertaken with local landholders who privately own the land within the Cowal system. The aggregated results showcase their knowledge and understanding of the ecological functions of the Cowal system, highlight some current ephemeral wetland management activities and indicate their concerns for the future. LEK is shown to be a valuable source of historical and planning data. For example, their combined memories and family records of the Cowal system provide the only historical record of the timeline of the wetland’s filling and drying, and support their concerns about the alteration of the natural hydrological regime because of developments in the catchment area. The research suggests that LEK should be actively sought by scientists, managers, and planners of wetlands, especially where baseline and systems information is scant.
... Es el caso de la epidemiología popular y los datos, que son producidos desde las comunidades que sufren los problemas de salud, y al mismo tiempo, aportan evidencia empírica para el desarrollo de políticas y programas de salud pública. Es decir, son datos de origen comunitario pero que se insertan en circuitos de conocimiento que los valida y los convierte en datos objetivos, verificables y confiables, como los que produce la ciencia (Corburn, 2002(Corburn, , 2003(Corburn, , 2005(Corburn, , 2007Porto & Finamore, 2012). ...
Narrativas de Santurbán es una investigación a profundidad de
uno de los conflictos por minería a gran escala más emblemáticos
de Colombia, conflicto que puso en el debate público la importancia de los páramos e impulsó un tema tan controversial como su delimitación. El libro revela que esta discusión trascendió los ámbitos legales y científicos. Desde una perspectiva innovadora, la autora reconstruye tres narrativas del conflicto y, desde allí,
analiza los distintos elementos de movilización y producción de
conocimiento implicados. Sus conclusiones muestran el potencial transformador de los conflictos socioambientales. El espacio del conflicto posibilita a los actores reflexionar sobre su situación, discutir, comunicar y buscar estrategias. Como resultado, explicitan conocimiento, lo movilizan y establecen nuevas conexiones, con lo cual, en alianza con otros actores, constituyen las narrativas. Este proceso, al tiempo que genera conocimiento, permite que los diferentes actores desarrollen y potencien su experticia científica, jurídica, activista y consuetudinaria, lo que contribuye al cambio social. De esta manera, el espacio del conflicto posibilita la producción y la movilización de conocimientos, la configuración de nuevos
actores y el empoderamiento de poblaciones, en la disputa política por la naturaleza, sus significados, sus usos y las relaciones que la sociedad establece con ella.
... Although these efforts generally result in a consensus on the ERA process, yet there are differences during the application of the process to specific situations. The risk assessment method consists of four commonly accepted stages: hazard identification, hazard exposure assessment, toxicity assessment, risk characterization (Corburn 2002). ...
... Although these efforts generally result in a consensus on the ERA process, yet there are differences during the application of the process to specific situations. The risk assessment method consists of four commonly accepted stages: hazard identification, hazard exposure assessment, toxicity assessment, risk characterization (Corburn 2002). ...
Environmental analytes have become important, where harmful pesticides and water pollutants are present. When environment or human health damage have occurred, the recovery processes could be impossible or very expensive. Using sensing systems such as sensors, biosensors, or nanobiosensors and biochemical responses such as biomarkers or genes are required for the development of control and precautional strategies. Environmental risk assessment (ERA) investigates the environmental risks and informs about handling of these risks. Subtitles of ERA are hazard identification, risk assessment, risk management, risk communication and monitoring, and feedback. These are all interpreted as main sustainability concepts. Risk assessment and management policies include quantitative and qualitative analysis of potential and/or specific chemical and/or biological pollutants. Accurate, fast analysis methods are required for the detection of these environmental pollutants. Biosensors can be used for analysis of these substances since biosensors are portable, have low cost, and can be tailored according to specific needs. They can also be combined with nanomaterials for increasing surface area and for enhancing specificity and selectivity. They have the potential to detect analytes at very low concentrations in a solution. These technical improvements can be applied to detect infections, medicines, heavy metals, and other contaminants that have yet to be discovered. Thus, nanobiosensors are perfect tools for hazard identification and environmental monitoring. In this chapter, nanobiosensors for ERA and management will be highlighted.
... Environmental justice advocates have long argued the importance of local knowledge for effective decision-making that does not exacerbate inequalities (Corburn, 2002(Corburn, , 2003Allen, 2007). Top-down planning that does not take into account the local context runs the risk of exacerbating inequalities in a similar manner to planning that does not address intersectionality. ...
Recent years have seen a proliferation of equity indices and environmental justice screening tools to support more just environmental planning processes that attempt to quantify the concept of equity. While the equity index framework has proven important to advance the conversation around environmental equity and connect need to investments, we are concerned that these tools do not adequately address the intersectional nature of environmental justice concerns, effectively incorporate local knowledge on the lived experience of residents, or provide an actionable set of next steps to be taken. We see opportunities to rethink and expand on the equity index model to address issues of climate justice and preparedness through the development of Planning for Resilience and Equity through Accessible Community Technology (PREACT), a multipurpose and multi-scalar climate preparedness and neighborhood planning software application informed by both community need and community assets. This perspective article will discuss the theoretical and practical importance of adding these perspectives into screening tools and will describe our research in Philadelphia, PA aimed at understanding these challenges and developing a more inclusive and community-responsive methodology for effective tool development.
... El proceso incluye la identificación del riesgo seguido de las evaluaciones de dosis-respuesta, la evaluación de la exposición para generar una caracterización de riesgo (Corburn, 2002) y el análisis de las incertidumbres. ...
p>Se aplicó la metodología del análisis cuantitativo del riesgo para determinar la probabilidad de ocurrencia de cáncer por exposición dérmica al cloroformo (subproducto de la desinfección) con base en la concentración medida en 96 muestras tomadas en la ciudad de Bogotá – Colombia, entre los años 2016 y 2019. El objetivo era investigar el riesgo de una mayor incidencia de cáncer dérmico por la exposición al cloroformo en el agua potable en diferentes temporadas. Los trihalometanos en las muestras de agua del grifo obtenidas durante el 2016-2019 fueron analizados por el método de purga y trampa con límites de detección (LoD) de 5 μg/L. El valor promedio de la concentración de cloroformo presentó incrementos graduales en los períodos de análisis encontrándose la menor concentración promedio en el período 2016-II con un valor de 24.1 μg/L y la máxima concentración en el período 2018-I con un valor de 35.8 μg/L. En conclusión, aunque se presentaron incrementos en la concentración del valor promedio de cloroformo, la exposición dérmica al subproducto de la desinfección analizado, en el período del presente estudio, no presenta un grave riesgo a la salud.</p
... Indeed, scholars of environmental justice have shown that the epistemic resources that dominate environmental regulation are especially ill-suited to capturing the experiences of the communities most exposed to pollution. For example, use of the concept of risk and risk assessment methodologies have been widely criticized from an environmental justice perspective, for failing to take a holistic view of environmental hazards and their harms to communities of color (Kuehn 1996;Corburn 2002). Similarly, Tsosie (2012) argues that U.S. environmental law ignores indigenous ideas about the sacredness of land and the privacy rights of human remains. ...
In the United States, ‘fenceline communities' next to petrochemical facilities have been conducting and advocating for air monitoring since the 1990s, highlighting gaps in U.S. environmental regulators' monitoring programs. Citizen science is imagined to be valuable as a source of data for filling such gaps. But fenceline communities' air monitoring activities also underscore regulators' hermeneutic ignorance, namely their lack of appropriate concepts, categories, and metrics for understanding the temporality of air pollution as experienced by marginalized communities. Citizen science could play a valuable role in addressing hermeneutic ignorance, by providing more adequate epistemic resources for understanding the environmental harms. In the case of community monitoring programs, these have included epistemic resources for understanding the immediacy of air pollution and the chronic nature of unpredictable spikes in pollution. However, regulators confronted with community-led monitoring have acknowledged neither citizen scientists’ contributions to epistemic resources nor their own hermeneutic ignorance, limiting the potential for citizen science to address institutionalized ignorance. Recognizing hermeneutic ignorance shows the important role that epistemic resources play in institutionalizing ignorance, and points to reforms necessary if citizen science is to make robust contributions to environmental protection.
... Some of these concepts move from more basic science into the field of risk assessment. Risk assessment is composed of hazard identification, exposure assessment, dose response, and risk characterization [37]. ...
"Environmental Health Literacy" (EHL) is embraced as important for improving public health by preventing disability and disease from our environment. This study aimed to determine knowledge and skill items identified by Environmental Health (EH) professionals as being associated with EHL and to understand how these items rank by importance. Such a coordinated effort to tease out skills and knowledge needed for EHL had not previously been made. We utilized a mixed-methods approach of semi-structured interviews of 24 EH professionals and a quantitative survey with 275 EH professionals across the United States. Interviews identified 37 skill and 69 knowledge items, which were used to create the survey questions. Survey results indicate 32 knowledge items and six skill items considered essential by >50% of respondents where consensus was reached between professional groups (chi square test: p > 0.05). We further identified six knowledge items, which >70% of EH professionals agreed were essential for EHL. The identification of these knowledge and skill items sets the stage for further research that includes exploring agreement with more diverse stakeholders, developing comprehensive measures of EHL and evaluation of methods and materials designed to improve EHL.
... Interrogating the technicalities of environmental governance processes, scholars have critiqued the power relations that privilege particular forms of knowledge and expertise. Dominant governmental frameworks for rectifying environmental injustice have continually delimited the extent of recognition and remedies for the hazards faced by marginalized communities (Corburn, 2002;Harrison, 2019;Pulido, 2016;Pulido et al., 2016). The instrumental orientation of government bureaucracies towards quantifying risks redirects discussions into technical debates about statistical reliability, often submerging community concerns and reestablishing the authority of experts, elevating particular research and regulatory questions, and eliding the systemic and complexly woven patterns of environmental injustices that are difficult to quantify and model (Davies, 2019;Ottinger, 2013;Wiebe, 2017). ...
Recent scholarship on environmental justice highlights a concern about the relationship between the racial state and social movement strategy. This paper addresses the ingenuity of environmental justice organizing in the Proctor Creek and South River watersheds of Atlanta, Georgia, each home to predominantly Black communities and unjust flows of toxicants and sewage through urban creeks, streams, and rivers. We begin from critiques of the failure of institutionalized environmental justice and the state’s role in maintaining environmental racisms. To examine organizing responses to these circumstances, we analyze the improvisational politics of social movements in the context of the racial state, theoretically drawing from Charles Lee’s Ingenious Citizenship (2016). Empirically investigating the work of Atlanta community organizers, we emphasize pathways of strategic innovation among environmental justice organizers that improvise against the racial state even while negotiating with it. The article presents evidence of organizers challenging dominant modes of quantifying environmental injustice, appropriating and repurposing the language of environmental restoration, and improvising in the spaces of environmental governance. While state recognition has sought to contain or co-opt movements, we demonstrate the continuing vitality of mobilizations that simultaneously make demands of the state and rupture the governing forms of knowledge and practice that reinforce environmental racisms.
... Finally, these studies refuse to divorce scientific inquiry from calls for political change. In fact, advocacy, justice, and/or political goal-setting are often seen as integral to community methodologies (Brown 1992;Corburn 2002;Ottinger 2017;Wylie et al. 2014). ...
Communities affected by petrochemical emissions face real dilemmas when deciding whether or not to protest. They also face difficult choices about how combative to be in confronting powerful companies, and whether to prioritize systemic or incremental change. Deciding whether to engage in scientific inquiry presents a dilemma parallel to the dilemma of protest. Community-led studies have the potential to bring egregious harms to light, bolstering community demands and heightening pressure on decision-makers, but the strategy comes with myriad costs and risks. Once the choice to engage science is made, there are again choices about how combative to be, and whether to prioritize systemic or incremental change. Community projects to produce knowledge may rely on and reproduce accepted scientific methodologies—an approach which may benefit the community but do little to disrupt underlying epistemic injustices. Alternatively, communities may aim at systemic, transformative change engage through an approach I call “epistemic innovation,” developing new concepts and methodologies to represent harms that have gone unacknowledged by scientific authorities. Like direct action and other combative forms of protest, epistemic innovation entails bigger risks than strategies that work for incremental change within an existing system. The dilemma of epistemic innovation can be eased through the efforts of allies willing to recognize and defend communities’ novel concepts and methods as advancements, not errors. Being able to identify and name “epistemic innovation” can help academics and other privileged actors legitimate and amplify the science being done in fenceline communities.
