Environmental inequality in West Africa

Jessie K. Luna and Gabin Korbéogo

Chapter 12 in Handbook on Inequality and the Environment, 2023, pp 182-201 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: This chapter reviews the topic of environmental inequality in Africa, with a particular focus on West Africa and the country of Burkina Faso. We address a broad tendency in mainstream approaches to African environmental issues of ignoring questions of inequality and downplaying the historical, social, political, and economic drivers of environmental degradation. The chapter begins with an overview of historically produced environmental inequality between Africa and wealthier nations; we review the role of colonialism and racism, the establishment of patterns of ecologically unequal exchange, and the effects of neoliberal structural adjustment policies and “sustainable development” programs. We then shift scales to look at inequalities within African nations. The bulk of the chapter explores two case studies from Burkina Faso, pulling out the threads of colonial history and ongoing environmental inequalities through examples of 1) land and access to natural resources and 2) cotton production and pesticide exposure. These case studies illustrate both historical and present-day inequities in resource enclosures, land grabbing, mining, export-oriented agricultural practices, and exposures to toxicity. We show how these inequalities create significant livelihood hardships for marginalized people and can contribute to violent conflict. Numerous groups have emerged to protest and resist these injustices, calling for changes to the underlying institutional, political, and economic drivers of these inequalities.

Keywords: Environment; Geography; Politics and Public Policy Sociology and Social Policy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.elgaronline.com/view/edcoll/9781800881136/9781800881136.00022.xml (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 503 Service Temporarily Unavailable

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:elg:eechap:20464_12

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.e-elgar.com

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Chapters from Edward Elgar Publishing
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Darrel McCalla ().