The forgotten casualties: women, children, and environmental change.

The author posits that women and children bear a disproportionate burden of environmental degradation and are in the worst position to mitigate the consequences of deteriorating environmental conditions. This article discusses the concept of environmental equity or fairness and its sociospatial impacts and the different adjustments made by women and children. Environmental equity is both an outcome and a process. Process equity includes the underlying causes of uneven distributions of resources. The 1992 Rio Declaration on Environment and Development defines 27 specific principles that broadly follow three forms of equity: social equity, generational equity, and procedural equity. Social equity is defined as the role of social, economic, and political forces in resource consumption and environmental degradation. Environmental risk is related to locational criteria such as cheap land and transportation access and by the social geography of places. Hazardous waste dumping is used to illustrate inequitable waste disposal in developing countries such as Brazil, Mexico, Nigeria, Lebanon, Syria, Venezuela, Zimbabwe, and South Korea. Generational equity is defined as fairness over time. The issue of permanent radioactive waste disposal is a current issue that has implications for future generations. Three strategies are important in assuring generational equity: the maintenance of natural and cultural diversity; a reduction in environmental degradation; and the provision of equal access to resources. Preservation of parkland is a positive strategy and lack of access to health services and reproductive health care is a negative strategy. Procedural equity is defined as the extent to which regulations are applied fairly. The example is given of higher fines for dumping waste in "nice White communities" compared to minority ones. Environmental law regulating hazardous waste exports has been minimally effective. Women and children are affected by particulate pollution and environmental toxins (lead and pesticides) in the air and water of urban areas and by a composite of poverty, development, and urbanization.