The rapid emergence Environmental Justice Movements (EJMs) in the United States has been motivated by the need to address a diverse array of social, political and cultural issues. Some of these issues include climate change, environmental contamination, and disputes over the extraction of resources from the environments. Some of the EJMs also focus on environmental threats to social issues of racial equality and the rights of the indigenous citizens as well as the poor, the farmers and other disadvantaged workers.
The activities of EJMs are informed by a wide spectrum of social movement theories, the most common one being the resource mobilization theory. An EJM like Mobilize Earth has been successful in its ability to acquire resources and mobilize members of society about the current strain in the environment ( Film News, 2020) . Project Mobilize Earth lobbies support from organizations and/or individuals, and uses their acquired proceeds to create awareness campaigns and speak the truth about ecological breakdown and the seriousness of climate change.
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Discussion
A majority of lawmakers, policymakers, and leaders of the major global corporations remain positive over the need for policy changes to address climate change. These groups of people have expressed their willingness to influence a change of attitude in the wider society based on the tabled scientific evidence. Conversely, scientists, industry groups, economists, and policy experts insist that there is no need to make policy changes as an effort to combat climate change ( Mackinder, 2010) . These groups say that the challenge has been blown out of proportion.
Mills argued that the “powerful elites” occupying dominant positions in political, economic or military institutions have the power to sway decisions by their decisions or lack of decisions ( Domhoff, 2007) . Alluding to Mill’s view of the power concentration in the US, the views of the sceptics are powerful enough to interfere with the government’s efforts of mitigating climate change. Some of the critics of climate change efforts hold elite positions in the governmental and their decisions are deterrent to the passing of critical policies, especially the ones that threaten their personal interests.
References
Domhoff, W. (2007). Who rules America: C. Wright mills, power structure research, and the failures of mainstream political science . Who Rules America? Power, Politics, & Social Change. https://whorulesamerica.ucsc.edu/theory/mills_critique.html
Film News. (2020). Joaquin Phoenix joins forces with extinction rebellion for new film tackling climate change . Film-News.co.uk. https://www.film-news.co.uk/news/UK/72233/Joaquin-Phoenix-joins-forces-with-Extinction-Rebellion-for-new-film-tackling-climate-change
Mackinder, E. (2010, August 24). Pro-environment groups outmatched, outspent in battle over climate change legislation . OpenSecrets News. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2010/08/pro-environment-groups-were-outmatc/
