Advisory participation that yields no policy power reads as inauthentic cooptation

Evidence

Environmental justice activists have been less than satisfied with participation offered them by, for example, the EPA in its advisory committees on environmental justice. The National Environmental Justice Advisory Committee (NEJAC) began as the EPA named environmental justice as a top priority early in the Clinton administration. Composed of stakeholders, many of whom had traditionally been ignored by the EPA, the NEJAC listened to hundreds of community members around the country give testimony on local environments. They passed numerous resolutions and gave the EPA much advice—but it was only an advisory body, and could not make policy. While many local and individual problems have been addressed via the NEJAC, numerous members have questioned its influence. One major participant called the NEJAC ‘a kind of federally sanctioned, formal mechanism for offering advice to EPA, which they generally don’t pay attention to’. This inauthenticity does not go unnoticed. A ‘place at the table’ will be welcomed, but will be seriously questioned if that participation does not result in a real change in the level and quality of community recognition in the development of environmental policy. Just because one is given some sort of ‘voice’ does not mean that they will be satisfied with a process that continues to deny them real results. — David Schlosberg, Defining Environmental Justice, 708

Categorization

• DEFINE: Illustrates what ‘inauthentic’ or token participation means in practice versus genuine procedural inclusion.
• XREF: Directly usable in the Legal Systems course: which justice dimension did the NEJAC actually deliver (recognition only), failing procedure and distribution? — connects to: Deliberative inclusion in civil society lacks force without state institutionalization — David Schlosberg, Defining Environmental Justice:…, 695; Failed advisory processes permanently suppress future civic engagement in communities; Token advisory processes can serve as pretense for predetermined siting decisions (+3 more)
• ADDENDUM: Supplies a concrete administrative case for the participation ideas in the sacrifice framing.

Broader Connections

• Participation and collective decision-making neutralize rather than redistribute subordinate power #corroborates (0.85) — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 800