Green Economy

Building a New Green Economy

CBE has worked since 1978 in support of low-income communities and people of color in California in the fight to reduce and prevent the local pollution that endangers health and undermines their quality of life. The emerging green economy is an incredible opportunity to create quality jobs that benefit environmental justice communities.

Domestic U.S. energy consumption contributes one quarter of the greenhouse gases that cause global warming.

The public sector offers enormous potential for green economic development if we were to invest in it: greening public buildings, retro-fitting and weather-sealing schools and government offices, cleaning up existing local pollution in brownfields, completing the restoration of highly polluted communities by creating and maintaining park space and community gardens. Investing in these labor-intensive initiatives would create local jobs in communities that need them.

Clean energy is another potential sector—investment would not only steer us away from the fossil fuels that accelerate climate change, it would efficiently create jobs.

We must mobilize a broad and powerful countervailing social movement to shape the green economy to be equitable and environmentally sustainable.

Principles of a Just Green Economy

The opportunities and benefits of this new economy should be directed primarily at those communities most in need – that is, poor urban, rural and BIPOC communities. It means equal access to the entire range of green jobs, by locating green research and development institutes in these communities and providing comprehensive education to prepare working class people for jobs in the green economy.

All elements of the green economy should be directed toward halting climate change and addressing the global ecological crisis. The focus must be on the restoration and creation of a green environment in those communities most horribly impacted by polluting industries. Eco-justice includes comprehensive, community-based research of health problems caused by pollution. Green manufacturing jobs should be in or near poor communities, but only with the strongest protections for employee and public health.

Democracy is a central principle of our green economic vision. That means transparency in decision-making and public participation at all levels of the decision-making process. Economic justice means a worker- and woman-centered economy, one that pays a living wages, and provides good health benefits and access to quality, affordable childcare. Lastly, democracy and economic justice mean the unrestricted right to organize into unions.