Journal of Planning Education and Research, Vol. 16, No. 4, 280-290 (1997)
DOI: 10.1177/0739456X9701600404
© 1997 Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning
A Model for Teaching Environmental Justice in a Planning Curriculum
R. O. Washington

Denise Strong

College of Urban and Public Affairs, University of New Orleans.

This article describes a course, Environmental Justice Movement, initiated at the College of Urban and Public Affairs at the University of New Orleans in the spring of 1995. A companion to a course in environmental planning, the course was designed to prepare planning students to engage in the environmental policy debate by exposing them to its historical, moral, and technical dimensions. By examining strategies and tactics of planning practice, they learn to apply their analytic and research skills to appropriate advocacy, mediation, and community planning roles. The course seeks to connect the environmental justice movement with social movement theory, concepts of procedural justice, and advocacy and equity planning. It integrates propositions and concepts about the politics of planning, land use policies, and practices with political philosophy, populist beliefs and what Perry (1994) calls "the street-level Rawlsian approach."