Water for Whom? Desalination and the Cooptation of the Environmental Justice Frame in Southern California

Based on an ethnographic study of a desalination proposal in California, the author argues that the environmental justice frame is being co-opted to facilitate community division and support a luxury commodity, benefiting private sector interests and organized labor over grassroots community groups.

• Community groups and non-governmental organizations utilize normative environmental justice arguments to oppose desalination, focusing on industrial burden, community disruption, and high costs.
• Organized labor and public sector actors align with the private sector to support desalination by framing it as a matter of employment, regional responsibility, and local independence.
• The author concludes that arguments in favor of desalination represent a cooptation of the environmental justice frame, which creates community division and supports a class bias for a luxury commodity.

APA

Neill, B. O. (2022). Water for Whom? Desalination and the Cooptation of the Environmental Justice Frame in Southern California. Climate Social Science Network. https://cssn.org/water-for-whom-desalination-and-the-cooptation-of-the-environmental-justice-frame-in-southern-california/

Chicago

Neill, Brian O’. Water for Whom? Desalination and the Cooptation of the Environmental Justice Frame in Southern California. Climate Social Science Network, 2022. https://cssn.org/water-for-whom-desalination-and-the-cooptation-of-the-environmental-justice-frame-in-southern-california/.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Neill |first1=Brian O’ |title=Water for Whom? Desalination and the Cooptation of the Environmental Justice Frame in Southern California |publisher=Climate Social Science Network |date=29 September 2022 |url=https://cssn.org/water-for-whom-desalination-and-the-cooptation-of-the-environmental-justice-frame-in-southern-california/ |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{neill2022water, author = {Neill, Brian O’}, title = {{Water for Whom? Desalination and the Cooptation of the Environmental Justice Frame in Southern California}}, institution = {Climate Social Science Network}, year = {2022}, month = sep, url = {https://cssn.org/water-for-whom-desalination-and-the-cooptation-of-the-environmental-justice-frame-in-southern-california/}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }