Week 2: Feminist Climate Change

In “Ecofeminism and Climate Change,” Greta Gaard explores the connections to climate change and gender justice. In this article, Gaard explains how climate change is connected to gender issues. A serious inequality of today is that women make most of the world’s food, but women and children are still going hungry, more than men. Gaard discusses how the traditional male-dominated environmental perspective discounts women and their views on the environment. Gaard advocates for ecofeminism, which is a movement that combines ecological and feminist concerns. “Climate change and first world overconsumption are produced by masculinist ideology and will not be solved by masculinist techno-science approaches” (Gaard 2015). A main argument of ecofeminists is that the solutions to climate change will not come from developing new green technology, but rather from addressing the social and gender inequalities of modern society. It is important to use careful framing and wording of gender and climate justice issues. The use of the word “women rather than gender tended to construct women as victims of environmental degradation in need of rescue” (Gaard 2015). Thus, ecofeminists have shifted from using the word “women” to the word “gender.” During the creation of many environmental policies, women have not had their voices heard, yet women are more affected by climate change. With the increasing carbon dioxide levels since the Industrial Revolution, the effects of climate change are already being seen and felt.  A tiny fraction of the world’s population, 20%, produces 80% of the greenhouse gas emissions. Although the carbon dioxide emissions are primarily coming from developed countries, the developing countries are more severely impacted. The effects of climate change will “create a refugee crisis and urgent migrations of poor people” (Gaard 2015). In the past, most of the environmental research was focused on men and then generalized and applied to women. Feminists have since looked into two main fields of research. There has been research into the effects of environmental contaminants on human health. Also, feminist animal studies look into how female animals are controlled for fertility reasons, how the livestock industry has negative impacts on the environment, and the detrimental effects of meat production on human health (Gaard 2015).

Additionally, in the article “A stranger silence still: the need for feminist social research on climate change,” Sherilyn MacGregor examines environmental sociology and feminist research. MacGregor emphasizes a need for more feminist research, as there is a considerable lack of research related to gender and the environment. Gender is relevant when discussing the environment because any solutions to environmental issues that are gender-neutral are insufficient. MacGregor discusses three main ideas in this article: the construction of climate change, climate change in everyday life experiences, and the responses of institutions and individuals. Climate change is happening now, so it would be a mistake to construct the issue as only part of the future. Environmental disasters have made people more aware of climate change. With the increasingly visible impacts of climate change, there is the idea that resources will be scarce and that refugees will be migrating into countries, which causes desires for security. However, “by ‘scientizing’ and ‘securizing’ it, climate change is constructed as a problem that requires the kinds of solutions that are the traditional domain of men” (MacGregor 2009). Men are the dominate figures in the discussions surrounding climate change, and the themes of science and security are typically that more associated with men diminish the voices of women. In the everyday lives of people, the effects of climate change are very real. The poor will be affected the most, and the term poor applies to women more often than men. The everyday lives of women will be more severely impacted by climate change than that of men. Because of this, the women often contain higher concern for the risks associated with climate change. MacGregor underlines the importance of hearing women’s voices on environmental issues. It is not right that “men dominate the issue at all levels, as scientific and economic experts, entrepreneurs, policymakers, and spokespeople” (MacGregor 2009).

In another article, “'Hey ho, Patriarchy has got to go!' Women for Climate Justice at the People's Climate March,” Julie Gorecki describes the importance of gender justice in relation to climate justice. Gorecki explains the importance of the People Climate March in New York City. Gender is important and relevant to climate justice because there are social and gender inequalities related to climate change. Compared to men, women will more drastically feel the effects of climate change. Many large, industrial companies are displacing the small farms of women. Melina Laboucan explains how “with the exploitation of Mother Earth we see a disproportionate imbalance between our genders around the world” (Gorecki 2014). Additionally, in the work “How Young Feminists are Tackling Climate Justice in 2016,” Maria Alejandra Rodriguez Acha also emphasizes the connection between gender justice and climate justice. Acha mentions how women are half of the population, yet our voices are not equally heard. Acha discusses the Paris agreement and the impact of youth movements for environmental justice. The Paris agreement failed to acknowledge how gender justice is connected to climate justice. Women, although vulnerable to the effects of climate change, will be drivers for the fight against climate change. “Frontlines inhabited by women around the world are not just lines of crisis but also frontlines of change” (Acha 2016).

Overall, these articles evoked a mixture of emotions within me. The first few articles created emotions of surprise, sadness, anger, and frustration. For instance, in the article“Ecofeminism and Climate Change,” I was both surprised and shocked by the facts presented about gender and climate justice. “Gender inequalities mean that women and children are 14 more times likely to die in an ecological disaster than men” (Gaard 2015). This statistic is both sad and shocking. I felt similar emotions of shock, sadness, and frustration in “A stranger silence still: the need for feminist social research on climate change.” Sherilyn MacGregor points out how 18 of the 22 listed “most influential spokespeople on climate change” were men (MacGregor 2009). In the piece, “How Young Feminists are Tackling Climate Justice in 2016,” I felt some hope because this work describes how women can be forces for change.

References

Acha, Maria Alejandra Rodriguez. 2016. “How Young Feminists Are Tackling Climate Justice in 2016.” Huffington Post. Retrieved January 21, 2019 (https://www.huffingtonpost.com/maria-alejandra-rodriguez-acha/how-young-feminists-climate-justice_b_9369338.html).

Gaard, Greta. 2015. “Ecofeminism and Climate Change.” Women’s Studies International Forum 49:20–33.

Gorecki, Julie Gorecki. 2014. “‘Hey Ho, Patriarchy Has Got to Go!’ Women for Climate Justice at the People’s Climate March | Rabble.Ca.” Retrieved January 21, 2019 (http://rabble.ca/news/2014/09/hey-ho-patriarchy-has-got-to-go-women-climate-justice-peoples-climate-march).

MacGregor, Sherilyn. 2009. “A Stranger Silence Still: The Need for Feminist Social Research on Climate Change.” The Sociological Review 57(2_suppl):124–40.