COMMUNITIES MUST FIT INTO THE ‘GREEN’ BOX
COMMUNITIES MUST FIT INTO THE ‘GREEN’ BOX
The so-called ‘environmental movement’ is not one unified whole. It is a diverse movement, made up of a wide range of groups and individuals, often with very different ideas and ways of working. However, there are sections of the environmental movement that have great difficulty in working with community organisations. These environmentalists start with their ideology, not with the needs of the community. They expect communities to fit into their ‘green’ box; never adapting their ideology to take account of the very real needs of communities.
Parts of the environmental movement expect communities to fit into their ‘green’ box; never adapting their ideology to take account of the very real needs of communities.
Examples of this abound
In the rush to build (subsidised) wind turbines under the last Labour Government, many environmentalists were as dismissive of the concerns of local communities as were the wind power companies. They saw the noise and visual impacts of some these turbines on communities as an unfortunate but inevitable by-product of the need for renewable energy. These communities didn’t fit into the green box.
Unlike communities concerned about fracking. Many environmentalists, who opposed fracking on climate grounds, scrambled to discover local reasons to oppose it so they could make common cause with the local communities.
It has been the same with low traffic neighbourhoods. Many environmentalists have formed a love-in with residents who want them, but show little interest in people who lose out: those experiencing extra traffic on their roads; bus users whose buses are stuck in the extra traffic; disabled people whose needs have not been thought through. All these people don’t fit into the green box and so are ignored and, in some cases, abused when they ask for justice.
Because these environmentalists regard themselves as the ‘good guys’, they see little need to explore and understand the real concerns of local communities. These concerns are diverse and complex. They don’t neatly fit into boxes. And they certainly don’t fit into boxes constructed by people who may be very different from themselves.
The rebellion against low traffic neighbourhoods in the East London Borough of Tower Hamlets was not primarily about people who wanted to drive unrestricted through the side streets. It was about the way the low traffic neighbourhoods disrupted the daily lives of a largely ethnic, and predominately poor, community. And yet this community is being vilified by some environmentalists for daring to suggest low traffic neighbourhoods don’t work for them.
Ironically, LTNs seem to have increased actual mileage from people going around the houses in spite of reduced traffic within the LTNs.
It is time for all in the environmental movement to destroy and recycle their little green boxes and interact, humbly and sensitively, with real communities in the real world.
John Stewart
