It\’s Getting Hot In Here

Posted on behalf of Jasper Conner, a member of the Industrial Workers of the World, Mountain Justice and the RReNEW Collective

We have to make it clear: a Green economy that doesn’t work for everybody, doesn’t work at all.

I’ve seen the demand for Green Jobs for a while now. It has spread so widely across the country that political candidates are forced to take a position on our demand. We should celebrate pushing this demand so far, but we also need to evaluate what we’ve won with this demand. (and what it is exactly that we are demanding?)

I organize in SW Virginia with the Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards (SAMS), in a coal field community directly impacted by mountaintop removal.  The other day I had a conversation with a strip miner who also runs a cluttered second hand shop in the town of Appalachia. We were able to find a lot of common ground in our conversation: we both don’t like surface mining, and we both would love to see Green jobs in the community. I didn’t need to convince him about more jobs in his community, so much as I needed to show him what we’re actually doing to make it happen.

While in Richmond, Va, our state Capitol, on a lobby trip I spoke with some industry people at length about some different things. I asked them what they thought about a more sustainable and diverse economy in Appalachia, and they were supportive of the idea. They were also very honest with their belief that coal won’t be around much longer. But they also asked an important question, “Where is that Green economy?”

Its Time to Take Direct Action

Standing there in the lobby of the General Assembly in Richmond, I started thinking, “Its time to take direct action.” The basic idea of direct action is simple, when a problem exists, you take the shortest steps toward solving it. So far we are just beginning to budge politicians on the issue and so I think its time to move into a more constructive, and direct phase of our movement. By constructive, I mean we need to start creating that Green economy that we have in our dreams, instead of waiting for politicians (who are nearly all supported by the fossil fuel industry) to catch up to us. We need to take direct action and make it happen!

Inspired by the SEED project that has been developing for a while now in the Coal River Valley of West Virginia, members of SAMS here in Wise County, Va have begun to think about building a sustainable economy in their community through the Wise Energy Forums. We’re looking at ways to create more jobs in the area that will be positive for the environment, and positive  for the community. Community members are meeting with small business owners, talking with the community college that trains a substantial portion of the local workforce, and developing a plan for building a local Green economy.

Developing a sustainable economy is not only a goal in itself, but its also a strategy for Appalachian communities to declare independence from King Coal’s strangle hold on the region. Projects like SEED, and the emerging Wise Energy for Sustainable Economic Development and Diversification (WESEDD) are critical to our movement’s success. If we want to end Mountain Top Removal, stop Climate Change, and secure a Sustainable Society for our grandchildren, we need to build a sustainable and diverse economy in Appalachia today. We just don’t have the time to wait on Obama, the States, or any friend of the status quo.

What kind of Green Jobs

The demand for Green Jobs is important, largely, because when we do move beyond coal, and beyond fossil fuels, we’ll need sources of income for hundreds of thousands of people who rely on the fossil fuel industry to feed their families. While this is an important thing to recognize, we also need to recognize that people don’t just need a job, they need a living wage job that they can work with dignity. As much as people care about the environment, we all work to put food on the table, and a roof over our heads, and not for love of the company. People don’t just need jobs, and we don’t just need a Green economy. We need a sustainable economy that allows all people to meet their needs and work with dignity.

I remember how shocked I was a while back to see that Walmart was a sponsor of Power Shift. If this movement is hoping for Walmart quality Green jobs, jobs where there is little full time employment, where Union organizers are fired on the spot, and where poverty wages reign; then you can count me out. If this is our vision, then we are pitting working people against the climate change movement. This doesn’t have to be the case though. We can envision a Green economy that is not just bearable for working people, but one that allows people to go to work with their head held high, and to come home to a refrigerator with plenty of food.

Who will wear the Green Hardhat?

When I think about Green jobs that are also good for workers, it makes me think a lot about who’s a part of the youth climate movement. It makes me wonder about what a bunch of young college students wearing Green hardhats look like to working people like my dad who wears a hardhat to work everyday. I think we need to be honest with ourselves, as college students we will likely not be getting jobs where hardhats are required. College students will not be the labor force of the Green economy; so its time the student environmental movement stopped playing dress up and instead started building alliances with the movements of working people who share our values for a Green economy.

Its time we take the lead of the Blue Green Alliance,  forged between workers Unions and Environmental organizations, and incorporate the demands of union members into our vision for a Green economy. We should be looking to the people who will actually wear the Green hardhat when we formulate our vision for a sustainable economy, just like we look to Appalachians for leadership in the movement to end Mountain Top Removal. Building alliances is a critical component of every successful social movement.

We also need to realize that the people who work in the industry have the most potential to immediately end our use of fossil fuels. We’ve been very focused on federal legislation, but not as much on developing relationships and coalitions with Unions and workers who run the industries we want to change. There was a time in our country when Unions fought mechanization because it robbed workers of dignity and drastically cut jobs in the community. We should evaluate our relationship to the current Union movement, figure out how we can build grassroots relationships that are mutually beneficial, and move forward with students and working people all fighting for a Green economy of living wages and workplace democracy. We might gain a lot from talking with organizations like United Students Against Sweatshops and the Student Labor Action Project who have been uniting students and workers for years.

We also need to explore alternative industry models. The United Steel Workers (leaders in the Blue Green Alliance) are currently exploring worker ownership models of running manufacturing factories. If we’re building a new Green economy, why not explore models like this that keep the profits in the hands of the hardest working people? This is just one of many questions we should be raising about the possibilities of life under the Green hardhat.

We should not only focus on developing a Green economy that is good for workers, but one that is good for everybody. Too often economic development happens at the expense of the same people, poor folks and communities of color. Many of the thriving commercial districts in major cities were once black neighborhoods where people had lived for generations. In building our Green economy, we must align ourselves with those fighting gentrification so that we have a Green economy for everyone.

In many rural areas, including Wise County, prisons are popping up and are touted as economic development. Prisons are a profit based industry in this country, and in rural areas prisons import prisoners from cities to fill their cells. This for-profit, and often privately owned, industry forces inmates into slavery where they could not possibly generate enough money for the high expenses of being incarcerated. As environmental justice organizers, we must build relationships with communities and organizations fighting the expansion of the prison industry.

We have to make it clear: A Green economy that doesn’t work for everybody, doesn’t work at all.