Fall 2020 - Digital Issue

On the Front Line of Climate Justice: Evolving a Collective Path

Features

• Indigenous Communities and Environmental Justice
  “Beyond their colonial and racist origins, and inability to acknowledge that traditional Indigenous knowledge can advance climate and environmental justice, the modern climate and environmental movements perpetuate Indigenous marginalization and exclusion in terms of their composition,” notes Raymond Foxworth. Yet Native nations and organizations have always been at the front of the fight to protect local resources from extractive capitalism. “For modern environmental and climate justice movements—and philanthropic support of these movements—to be truly impactful,” this article contends, “they must let Indigenous peoples lead.”
  by Raymond Foxworth
  
  
• Preserving Our Place: Isle de Jean Charles
  “Preserving a place, whether physically, historically, or emotionally, usually comes about through great loss—as is the case with Isle de Jean Charles,“ writes Chantel Comardelle, in this moving meditation on a Louisiana community fighting for self-preservation in the face of long-ongoing social injustice and climate change.
  by Chantel Comardelle
  
  
• Indigenizing Environmental and Climate Justice: Reconciling the Past May Be the Only Way to a Sustainable Future
  “Whereas mainstream discussions of environmental racism typically focus on contemporaneous acts of land use and resource exploitation,” notes the author, “Indigenous environmental issues are deeply rooted in cyclical acts of displacement and alienation.” This article, which looks at the United States overall and Hawai`i in particular, examines the history and considers intersectional environmentalism as “one potential area in which a more holistic approach to environmental injustice and just futures can be considered.”
  by Trisha Kehaulani Watson-Sproat
  
  
• Regeneration—from the Beginning
  “Traditional agriculture and the environmental movement are rooted in the same Western anthropocentrism, in that they both start with timelines and definitions that often do not include Indigenous peoples, practices, and worldviews,” writes A-dae Romero-Briones. “But regenerative agriculture, still in its infancy, has the power to be more than another oppressive movement.”
  by A-dae Romero-Briones
  
  
• An Indigenous Vision for Our Collective Future: Becoming Earth’s Stewards Again
  “Alaska’s laws and state constitution do not recognize Tribal sovereignty or our customary and traditional life ways,” writes Native Peoples Action, “forcing us to fight for our rights to steward our own lands, animals, and waters. Instead, state government and educational systems recognize non-Native ‘pioneers’ and more recent newcomers as key figures in Alaska’s history, essentially leading to Indigenous erasure.” This erasure, of course, affects everyone and everything. As this article reminds us, “we are all equal in the sacred balance of life.”
  by Native Peoples Action
  
  

Departments

• Network Governance as an Empowerment Tool
  “It’s easy to focus on the structures of governance that we can see: advisory boards, stewardship groups, steering committees, organizational charts. It’s far less common to think about what these structures are trying to achieve,” note the authors. This article proposes seven dimensions for networks to consider toward empowered engagement, contribution, and collaboration.
  by Blythe Butler and Sami Berger
  
  
• Who Owns Philanthropy? A Look through an Antiracist Lens
  Who owns philanthropy? Contrary to common discourse, it is not the folks who run foundations. This conversation with Takema Robinson, executive director of the Greater New Orleans Funders Network, discusses intersections of natural and not-so-natural disasters (Hurricane Katrina, the crumbling of democracy in the United States) and how philanthropy is behind the curve in terms of evolving its ethos.
  
  
• Can Volunteers Help Nonprofits Keep Their Community Roots Alive?
  Maintaining a volunteer base can be challenging in today’s nonprofit world. With more and more “professionals” at the helm, active community participation gets sidelined. What to do? This article discusses the importance of integrating nonprofits’ instrumental and expressive dimensions for a more balanced practice.
  by Sue Carter Kahl