Since the time of its first white settlers, the US West has been paradoxically imagined as a place of infinite natural abundance and looming resource scarcity. In the era of accelerating drought brought on by fossil fuel-induced climate change and water mismanagement, long-standing resource anxiety increasingly manifests as discourse about imminent “water wars.” Yet while … De-escalating Water Crisis
Is it fixed yet? Can you trust the water now? That’s the question everyone has for Flint, almost eight years into a water crisis that has left behind continuing uncertainty and apprehension about the toxicity of the city’s water supply. Flint is a postindustrial city in the American Midwest with a remarkable history of union … From Management to Justice
In November 2021, the Flint water crisis was resolved from the state’s legalistic perspective. A federal judge awarded city residents a $626 million-dollar settlement for damages that dovetailed with the January 2021 indictment of former Michigan governor Rick Snyder. “Although this is a significant victory for Flint,” the plaintiffs’ lawyer Corey Stern told journalists, “we … The Legacies of Jim Crow Water Infrastructures
Social and environmental justice are critical to water infrastructure and technology; without them, climate action relief is impossible. Approximately 80 percent of the US population resides in cities, and the number of global residents living in cities is expected to increase to seven billion by the year 2050. In the United States and in many … Justice in Water Infrastructure
The US uses the Sonoran Desert both as a site to force non-white migrants to risk death and as a Hollywood film location to mimic Southwest Asia and North Africa through tropes of treasure hunting and fighting “terrorists,” a racist framing also deployed against Black and Brown migrants. This Western genre of representational imaginary—migration/voyage, treasure … New Gold Rush, Same Genocide: Mining and Draining the Southwest Is Destroying Indigenous Communities in the Name of Sustainable Development
The word relief has many interpretations, from remedy, rest, and help to distinguishing contrasts, edges, and surface inequalities. Policymakers, governments, and private technology interests use the term “relief” in a form of Orwellian double-speak to name the harm they cause by the idea of its opposite. By doing this, these entities seek to control the … Relief Remix