ABSTRACT
Environmental degradation is not experienced by all populations equally; hazardous and
toxic waste sites, resource contamination (e.g., exposure to pesticides), air pollution, and
numerous other forms of environmental degradation disproportionately affect low income
and minority communities. The communities most affected by environmental injustices are
often the same communities where social workers are entrenched in service provision at the
individual, family, and community level. In this article, we use a global social work
paradigm to describe practical ways in which environmental justice content can be infused
in the training and education of social workers across contexts in order to prepare
professionals with the skills to respond to ever-increasing global environmental degradation.
We discuss ways for social work educators to integrate and frame environmental concerns
and their consequences for vulnerable populations using existing social work models and
perspectives to improve the social work profession’s ability to respond to environmental
injustices. There are significant social work implications; social workers need to adapt and
respond to contexts that shape our practice, including environmental concerns that impact
the vulnerable and oppressed populations that we serve.
