ABSTRACT
The concept of environmental justice may have emerged recently in Nepal but this study reveals that concerns for social justice in environmental matters have existed for a while. The basic elements of environmental justice movements can be traced back to social movements of several decades ago – whether passive or active. In the past, collective action represented mainly a concern for access to land and other natural resources for the survival of marginalized groups that included women, lower castes, and indigenous peoples. In the repressive Rana and Panchayat regimes prior to 1990, resistance was passive or just symbolic, and movements were sporadic and localized.
However, particularly since 1990, as urbanization and industrialization increased along with the use of chemicals and other substances, some of which are also detrimental to human health, social movements have also been organized to resist the maldistribution of new pollutants and hazardous substances in the society affecting the poor as well as socio-politically and culturally marginalized and oppressed.
