Addressing Environmental Racism
Environmental racism is a heavy and often depressing subject. However, it is an important topic to address and the greater the awareness, the greater the movement is to combat it.
Illustration by Caitlin Noble.
I’ve grown up idolising white environmentalists and big-name conservation groups. The belief that only famous conservationists, environmentalists and animal-loving charities can save our planet has been deeply ingrained in me from a young age, simply because of the media that I was exposed to.
When I first read the book The Big Conservation Lie by John Mbaria and Mordecai Ogada, I was stunned by the very powerful point that Natural History TV shows and other media have long centred white, mostly male characters, saving wild animals and having big, exciting adventures. This, according to the authors, has “forever been used to drive the point home that as the planet experiences immense destruction of species, habitats, and ecosystems, it is only white people who really care.”
To someone who has spent their entire life with their head in a book by Diane Fossey or watching David Attenborough documentaries on BBC 1, Mbaria and Ogada’s words may seem somewhat harsh. But however shocking, the media has for decades spun a euro-centric narrative around wildlife. Mbaria and Ogada go on to say that “conservation is now almost exclusively associated with whiteness” - and they aren’t wrong. Looking back over the BBC nature programmes I watched as a child, the books I read growing up, I realised that my love of the natural world came from a false, idealised, and often racist view of what wildlife conservation should be.
In many European and North American countries alongside Australia, we have lost our connection with nature. We put profit and resource extraction before the planet’s health. To use a current example, Indigenous people and their allies are, at the time of writing, blockading Fairy Creek and it’s old growth forest on Vancouver Island from forest clearance. The loggers are backed up by the historically racist and violent Royal Canandian Mounted Police (RCMP), and while the situation at Fairy Creek is ever-changing, we can use this as a case study to show that the powers that be all too often assign economic value to nature - and attack anyone who gets in their way.
We have neglected the teachings and wisdoms of indigenous people, and closed our minds to people who aren't wearing a lab coat. Traditional Indigenous Territories make up 22% of the world’s land surface, but they take care of 80% of the planet’s biodiversity. Indigenous people have thousands of years of ancestral knowledge about everything from increasing biodiversity to mitigating climate disasters. Yet, we don’t listen to them. We don’t learn from them. We cut them off from their homeland in the name of “conservation”. This is nothing new - national parks are a prime example, with the famed, dramatic and wild National Parks in the United States of America all created through the forced (and all too often violent) eviction and relocation of Native American tribes.
Looking back over history, we can see that the violent colonisation of countries led to the oppression of native peoples. But that all ended a long time ago…right? Well, actually, no.
There is a term that many conservationists will shy away from, but in fact they may well be indirectly (or directly) guilty of: neo-colonialism. The term neo means a new or revived form of something; and there is a strong argument to suggest that a new version of colonialism has appeared. Taking root in the days of the colonial era trophy hunter, and growing to become a sinister force lurking behind modern-day, militarised conservation.
For hundreds of years, huge European empires systematically oppressed millions of people across entire continents. Things really kicked off in the 1880s when The British, German, French and Dutch started vying for control of Africa in its entirety - exploiting its resources and crushing the spirit of its people. We call it the colonial era, as almost the entire world was split into colonies owned by small European nations. Officially, colonialism “ended” sometime around 1975, as many countries either left their colonies or were forced out through revolutions. Yet, a legacy of oppression was left behind.
Many argue colonialism never ended. In fact, some say it’s still alive and well - particularly in “wildlife conservation”. There are still many white, often European people who appear to think that it is them, and only them, who can save the world’s wildlife and wild places. They have taken the ideals of the cruel, bloody colonial era, and used them to put a monopoly on “saving endangered species”. In Kenya, local people are pushed aside; forced out and kept out of their ancestral land by high, impenetrable fences, strict lawns and shoot-on-sight ranger policies - a tactic called fortress conservation. This often has disastrous consequences. Unable to work on their land sustainably, locals turn to poaching as a source of income. If they are caught, the racist myth that “all locals are the poachers” is perpetuated.
It is a sad fact that many of our most loved and treasured wildlife heroes have upheld this imperialist ideology. Before becoming the famous saviour of lions (despite only saving about 12 in a population of a thousand) often-worshipped “conservationist” George Adamson hunted and killed wildlife. According to Mbaria and Ogada, the man who was the real life inspiration for the film “Born Free” tried and failed to set up many businesses, many of which involved killing African Wildlife. The first three lion cubs he and his wife Joy rescued were orphans - because he had shot and killed their mother.
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Is environmentalism racist? If you listen to indigenous wisdom and knowledge, work with local communities to safeguard their land and protect their economy, history and culture - no. But if you take the approach of hundreds of “international” NGOs, governments and corporations, then yes. You will see racist frameworks at play in the name of Environmentalism.
One major case study in this argument is WWF. A pillar of conservation heroics for decades, the World Wide Fund for Nature has poured vast amounts of money into conserving wildlife - and equally large amounts into creative advertising to boost membership and elicit emotional responses from the general public. On the surface, they have excellent outreach and media strategies and are a hugely valuable asset in the fight against wildlife crime. But are they really all they seem?
Over the last few years WWF has come under fire. Not only do their directors and trustees have direct links to some of the biggest polluters on the planet, such as Unilever, Coca Cola and Texaco, but they have also legitimised, organised or ignored some horrendous human rights abuses of indigenous people.
It was Survival International who initially investigated the alleged abuse of Indigenous people at the hands of park rangers. It was soon discovered that the rangers who perpetrated this violence were funded by WWF. In southeast Cameroon, large areas of ancestral land belonging to the Baka “Pygmies” (see note at the end of this article for an explanation of terminology) have been turned into national parks. Although this sounds great (who doesn’t want to protect rainforests?) Survival International argues that this model of conservation turns the people living on the newly-converted land into criminals. Their way of life and activities such as hunting are restricted or outright banned, and they are often forcefully evicted and relocated, resulting in poverty and social issues among communities.
Since 2000, WWF has been funding the creation of these parks. They’ve worked with a logging company exploiting the Baka’s forests, and funded anti-poaching squads. Without WWF, these squads wouldn’t exist - so what’s the problem?
These squads have been accused of committing terrible crimes against the Baka people - including beating them and sexually assaulting Baka women.
Survival International has stated that not only does WWF know about these crimes, they have continued to fund the projects for a decade. Many other organisations and researchers have expressed concerns and told WWF what has been happening. Despite this, no action has been taken. In fact, this article from the Independent, published a shocking 24 years ago, shows that not only have conservation organisations such as WWF excluded indigenous people from conservation efforts, they’ve actively funded human rights abuses against these groups in order to essentially steal their land.
All this research points to one thing: White conservation unquestionably funds indigenous oppression. If we are to respect the rights of Indigenous people, should we not be returning the land back to them to care for through their own, time-proven methods and practices? And in the cases of land being destroyed beyond repair, should we not hold our governments accountable and make them pick up the pieces - instead of letting them simply destroy land and leave the burden to fall at the feet of the people who have always lived there?
Environmentalism, the act of caring for our planet, is not racist. But environmentalism as so many of us know it, as so many of you reading this article will know it, upholds oppressive, racist and neo-colonialist ideals.
That was all very “doom and gloom”, but as privileged conservationists and environmentalists in the Global North, we need to be aware of these issues. In the spirit of the Bloom in Doom ethos, I’d like to point you towards some positive action points you can do following on from this article.
- Connect to your land on a local level. If you live in Europe, this might mean volunteering through an organisation such as WOOF UK, joining a local traditional crafts group, planting your own vegetables, foraging from the hedgerows or wild swimming.
- Read “Braiding Sweetgrass” by Robin Wall Kimmerer. Here, indigenous scientist Kimmerer expertly weaves her knowledge as a botanist with wisdom learnt from Native Americans including her own nation, the Potawatomi.
- Read “The Big Conservation Lie”, an eye-opening book on neo-colonialism in conservation by John Mbaria and Mordecai Ogada.
- Follow and support the work of Survival International - an organisation that has been fighting on behalf of indigenous people for decades.
Note on terminology from Survival International: “Pygmy” is an umbrella term commonly used to refer to the hunter-gatherer peoples of the Congo Basin and elsewhere in Central Africa. The word is considered pejorative and avoided by some tribespeople, but used by others as a convenient and easily recognised way of describing themselves. Read more: https:// www.survivalinternational.org/info/terminology
George Steedman Jones
George is a first year Marine and Natural History Student at Falmouth University, who tells stories of nature and conservation through a variety of mediums. While conservation photography is his main passion, he has loved writing from a young age and pursued nature writing as a form of science communication alongside his photography over the last year. An environmentalist and conservation volunteer, he has been passionate about the natural world, wildlife and environmental issues throughout his life, fuelled by a childhood spent in nature.
You can find him on Instagram: @george_brynmor.