ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses some of the theoretical features of the recognition paradigm of environmental injustice, where a paradigm simply refers to a criterion whose presence in someone's social circumstances is used by activists, scholars, politicians, and others to identify that injustice is occurring. People invoke paradigms of environmental injustice, either directly or implicitly, to reveal or prove the occurrence of injustices happening as part of their efforts to raise awareness of wrongdoing and motivate legal and policy solutions that will make for improved futures for people experiencing injustices. The chapter describes that the recognition paradigm is uniquely positioned to understand the ecological dimensions of environmental injustice, which has important implications, for some communities, about what remedies are necessary for achieving justice. Distributive/procedural versions of environmental injustice defend the equality of all citizens before the societal institutions of their nation states.
