Blue and Green Shades of Health: The Comparative Framing of Health Risks in the Labor and Environmental Movements

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This project examines the strategic use of scientific knowledge to facilitate coalition building between social movements. Its focus is on similarities and differences in how labor organizations and environmental organizations identify health risks in the workplace and the general environment. The project will study how successful coalitions may be formed between the two movements by jointly considering occupational health and environmental health science, which have historically been discrete areas. Scholars who study social movements are increasingly trying to develop more complex approaches and expand their inquiries to include social movements in science, technology, health, and the environment. This project will assist in understanding the roles played by concepts and framing of risks (e.g., environmental justice, just transition) and by familiarity and experience, in facilitating or interfering with attempts to build alliances. The research project has three tasks. First, approximately 20 cases of successful and unsuccessful efforts at coalition building will be identified through an extensive literature review and survey of leaders in the labor and environmental movements. From these cases, four will be selected for the second task, involving interviews and observations of two successful and two unsuccessful cases of coalition building. The cases will include unionized and non-unionized labor organizations, each with a successful and unsuccessful effort. The third task is an historical study of one labor organization that has been significantly involved in the establishment of labor-environmental coalitions. The project provides graduate training opportunities, and its focus is of interest to an ongoing research group at the university. Besides scholarly publications, dissemination to labor and environmental groups and to government agencies is planned and can lead to new opportunities for coalition building between diverse groups.