Denial and the Process of Moral Exclusion in Environmental Conflict

Journal of Social Issues, Fall, 2000 by Susan Opotow, Leah Weiss

Including or excluding particular stakeholders changes the coalition strength supporting or opposing particular positions. The ideological mix of stakeholders on a particular side of a conflict can indeed influence public and political support as well as determine the kinds of trade-offs that may acceptably resolve a conflict. Therefore, stakeholder exclusion and inclusion influences the nature, course, and outcome of environmental conflicts.

Although within-group exclusion of "extremists" may be pragmatic, it risks losing the most distilled and thorny aspects of an environmental conflict. So-called extremists may hold the key to durable resolution because they raise issues that won't go away. Denying the concerns of extremists risks forging an easier, faster, but less enduring agreement unleavened by diversity of perspectives. In the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's environmental regulatory negotiations ("reg-negs"), it is often difficult for some stakeholders to procure a seat at the table. As a consequence, many of those negotiated settlements have disappointed environmentalists, industry, and state regulators. Thus, denial of the legitimacy or relevance of extremists' concerns may work, but only in the short run. In the long run, extremists' commitment, persistence, principle-based positions, willingness to sacrifice, and access to media attention can ultimately change public opinion.

Stakeholders labeled extremists and excluded from mainstream dispute resolution forums may utilize warfare-like tactics to achieve ends they deem important. Because of the attention that dramatic actions can garner, they can achieve public recognition, engage the public in environmental issues attitudinally and behaviorally, and ultimately, influence the conflict process. Environmental groups once considered extreme, such as Greenpeace and Earthfirst!, continue to gain mainstream acceptance by successfully challenging the acceptability of current practice. The Public Interest Research Group's (PIRG's) campaign to identify and shut down old power plants across the nation, at one time a radical idea, received significant political support from Democratic and Republican gubernatorial candidates in recent elections.

Although extreme positions are not inevitably connected with violence, those who self-identify as extremist or approve of extreme methods for achieving their goals may normalize or glorify violence. As a result of repeated exposure, violence can increasingly seem effective, legitimate, normal, and even a sublime form of human expression. This denies the potential of violence to damage relationships, people, the environment, and the constructiveness of the conflict resolution process. Although within-group ideological diversity that includes extremists can be difficult and distasteful, slow progress, and seem inefficient in the short run, in the long run its inclusiveness can promote environmentalism by forging creative, integrative, far-reaching, and durable solutions to environmental conflicts.