Graduation Date
Fall 2018
Document Type
Thesis
Program
Master of Arts degree with a major in Sociology
Committee Chair Name
Dr. Anthony Silvaggio
Committee Chair Affiliation
HSU Faculty or Staff
Second Committee Member Name
Dr. Renée Byrd
Second Committee Member Affiliation
HSU Faculty or Staff
Keywords
Climate change, Criminality, Floods, Hurricanes, Incarceration, Intersectionality, Militarization, Consent decree, Genocide, Mass incarceration, Mental health, Native people, Paris climate change agreement, Pensions, Police, Power elite, Prison ecology project, Prison industrial complex, Prison labor, Solitary confinement, Treadmill of production, Treadmill of destruction, Unions, Universal declaration of human rights, Wildfires, Women
Subject Categories
Sociology
Abstract
This thesis examines the link between anthropogenic climate change and mass incarceration by examining how governments address conditions in and around prisons resulting from hurricanes and wildfires. Critical Environmental Justice, Treadmill of Production and Destruction theories are synthesized using what is debuted here as an intersectional camera based on the theory of intersectionality. It examines how Trump administration policies will greatly exacerbate dangers caused by climate change and increase risks and dangers caused by mass incarceration. In addition to being a call to action, this project is intended to serve as a resource for prisoner rights activists. Prisons have become more ubiquitous, perilous and toxic over the past five decades, while the network of local, state, federal, and private systems responsible for their safety and maintenance has become increasingly chaotic. This thesis is a descriptive study that utilizes existing data from academic papers, news reports and legal cases to highlight the impacts of climate change on the marginalized inmate community and, simultaneously, the natural environment that surrounds incarceration facilities.
The need for this analysis is particularly imperative in light of recent efforts by the Trump administration to bureaucratically and legislatively eviscerate regulations designed to protect human and ecological health that will magnify dangers caused by increasing global temperatures and subsequent extreme weather events like hurricanes, floods, and wildfires. Further, Trump Administration policies designed to increasingly criminalize and incarcerate already marginalized communities will exacerbate their vulnerabilities to the effects of climate change.
Citation Style
ASA
Recommended Citation
Veit, John L., "How anthropogenic climate change exacerbates vulnerability in prison communities; a critical environmental justice analysis" (2018). Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects. 205.
https://digitalcommons.humboldt.edu/etd/205
Included in
Ethnic Studies Commons, Indigenous Studies Commons, Inequality and Stratification Commons, Latina/o Studies Commons, Politics and Social Change Commons, Work, Economy and Organizations Commons