tag:theconversation.com,2011:/institutions/occidental-college-1615/articlesOccidental College2023-07-14T19:12:44Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2098242023-07-14T19:12:44Z2023-07-14T19:12:44ZHollywood on the picket line – 5 unsung films that put America’s union history on the silver screen<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537548/original/file-20230714-19-zejzwk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=23%2C34%2C3859%2C2549&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Actors Emily Blunt, Robert Downey Jr., Matt Damon, Cillian Murphy and Florence Pugh were among those who walked out of the premiere of 'Oppenheimer.'</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/the-cast-of-oppenheimer-including-british-actress-emily-news-photo/1531859433?adppopup=true">Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Some of Hollywood’s top stars are <a href="https://apnews.com/article/hollywood-actors-writers-strike-1da6262b2506d64822201d53e5d76c43">joining screenwriters on the picket line</a> after the main U.S. actors union voted to take part in an ongoing strike.</p>
<p>SAG-AFTRA, which represents more than 150,000 screen and stage actors, announced on July 13, 2023, that its <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/article/actors-strike-why.html">members would go on strike</a>. </p>
<p>In so doing, they join members of the Writers Guild of America who have been on strike for several weeks. </p>
<p>Battles between Hollywood unions and the studios have <a href="https://laist.com/news/la-history/hollywood-strike-1945-unions-iatse-bloody-friday">taken place since the 1940s</a>. But this is the first time since the Eisenhower administration that the two major Hollywood unions have been on strike at the same time. The action – sparked by a long-running dispute over pay and greater protection against use of artificial intelligence and the rise of streaming services like Netflix – has shut down productions and become increasingly acrimonious. One Hollywood source <a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2023/07/studios-allegedly-wont-end-strike-til-writers-start-losing-their-apartments">told a reporter</a> that the studios want these strikes to “drag on until union members start losing their apartments and losing their houses.” </p>
<p>The strikes come at a time when polls suggest <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/354455/approval-labor-unions-highest-point-1965.aspx">unions are more popular in the U.S. than at any time since 1965</a>, and the labor movement is experiencing a resurgence of organizing.</p>
<p>Since the mid-1900s, Hollywood studios have depicted the collective efforts of working people to improve their lives and gain a voice in their workplaces and the larger society with both sympathy and hostility. Independent producers, who gained a foothold starting in the 1970s, have generally been friendlier toward workers and their unions. </p>
<p>Some of the most well-known labor movies champion the struggle of the everyday worker: “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0027977/">Modern Times</a>,” released in 1936, stars Charlie Chaplin going crazy due to his job on an assembly line. It features the famous image of Chaplin caught in the gears of factory machinery. “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0032551/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">The Grapes of Wrath</a>,” a 1940 adaptation of John Steinbeck’s novel, tells the story of sharecropper Tom Joad’s radicalization after his family and other migrant workers experience destitute conditions in California’s growing fields and overcrowded migrant camps. </p>
<p>1979’s “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079638/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">Norma Rae</a>” is based on the life of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/15/us/15sutton.html">Crystal Lee Sutton</a>, who worked in a J.P. Stevens mill in North Carolina. The textile worker and single mom inspires her fellow workers to overcome their racial animus and work together to vote in a union. “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0212826/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">Bread and Roses</a>,” a 2000 film about low-wage janitors in Los Angeles, is based on the Service Employees International Union’s <a href="https://www.labor.ucla.edu/what-we-do/research-tools/campaigns-and-research/justice-for-janitors/">Justice for Janitors</a> movement.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">In an iconic scene from ‘Modern Times,’ Charlie Chaplin gets caught in the gears of factory machinery.</span></figcaption>
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<p>There’s also an anti-labor strain of Hollywood history, particularly during <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691153964/the-second-red-scare-and-the-unmaking-of-the-new-deal-left">the post-World War II Red Scare</a>, when studios purged left-wing writers, directors and actors through <a href="https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/insights/hollywoods-red-scare-spread-stigma-association">an industrywide blacklist</a>. Red Scare-era releases such as 1952’s “Big Jim McLain” and the 1954 film “On the Waterfront” often depicted unions as corrupt or infiltrated by communist subversives.</p>
<p>When I teach labor history, I’ve used films to supplement books and articles. I’ve found that students more easily grasp the human dimensions of workers’ lives and struggles when they are depicted on the screen. </p>
<p>Here are five unsung labor movies, all based on real-life events, that, in my view, deserve more attention. </p>
<h2>1. ‘<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078008/?ref_=fn_tt_tt_6">Northern Lights</a>’ (1978)</h2>
<p>This is a fictionalized account of a fascinating but little-known political movement: <a href="https://www.history.nd.gov/ndhistory/npl.html">the Non-Partisan League</a>, which organized farmers in the upper Midwest in the early 1900s. </p>
<p>During this period, Midwestern farmers worked long hours to harvest grain that they were then forced to sell for low prices to elevators, while paying high prices to the big railroad companies and banks. Economic insecurity was a part of life, and foreclosures were routine. </p>
<p>The film follows Ray Sorenson, a young farmer influenced by socialist ideas who leaves his North Dakota farm to become a Non-Partisan League organizer. In his beat-up Model T, he travels the back roads, talking to farmers in their fields or around the potbellied stoves of country stores. He eventually persuades skeptical farmers that electing NPL candidates could get the government to create cooperative grain elevators, state-chartered banks with farmers as stockholders, and limits on the prices that railroads can charge farmers to haul their wheat. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Northern Lights’ is based on an early-20th-century farmer-led political uprising in the Midwest.</span></figcaption>
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<p>In 1916, the Non-Partisan League did, in fact, elect farmer <a href="https://www.history.nd.gov/exhibits/governors/governors12.html">Lynn Frazier</a> as governor of North Dakota with 79% of the vote. Two years later, the NPL won control of both houses of the state legislature and created the North Dakota Mill, still the only state-owned flour mill, and the <a href="https://ilsr.org/rule/bank-of-north-dakota-2/">The Bank of North Dakota</a>, which remains the nation’s only government-owned general-service bank.</p>
<h2>2. ‘<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0033533/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">The Devil and Miss Jones</a>’ (1941)</h2>
<p>In this screwball comedy with a pro-union twist, Charles Coburn plays John P. Merrick, a fictional New York City department store owner.</p>
<p>After his employees hang him in effigy, the tycoon goes undercover to ferret out the agitators of a union drive led by a store clerk in the shoe department and a union organizer. </p>
<p>As he learns more about their lives, Merrick grows sympathetic to his workers – and even falls in love with one of his employees – none of whom know his true identity. As the workers prepare to go on strike, and even picket his house, Merrick reveals that he owns the store and agrees to their demands over pay and hours – and even marries the employee he’s fallen for. </p>
<p>The film was likely inspired by <a href="http://msr-archives.rutgers.edu/archives/Issue%2016/essays/Opler.htm">the 1937 sit-down strikes</a> by employees of New York City’s department stores. </p>
<h2>3. 'Salt of the Earth’ (1954)</h2>
<p>Decades ahead of its time, this story of New Mexico mine workers deals with issues of racism, sexism and class.</p>
<p>After a mine accident, the Mexican-American workers decide to strike. They demand better safety standards and equal treatment, since white miners are allowed to work in pairs, while Mexican ones are forced to work alone. The strikers expect the women to stay at home, cook and take care of the children. But when the company gets an injunction to end the men’s protest, the women step up and maintain the picket lines, earning greater respect from the men.</p>
<p>Made at the height of the Red Scare, the film’s writer, producer and director <a href="https://www.highonfilms.com/salt-of-the-earth-1954-essay/">had been blacklisted</a> for their leftist sympathies, so the film was sponsored by the International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers, not a Hollywood studio. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002095/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">Will Geer</a>, a blacklisted actor who later portrayed Grandpa Walton on the TV drama “The Waltons,” played the repressive sheriff. Mexican actress Rosaura Revueltas played the leader of the wives. The other characters were portrayed by real miners and their wives who participated in the strike against <a href="https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/empire-zinc-strike/">the Empire Zinc Company</a>, which served as the inspiration for the film. </p>
<p>The film itself was blacklisted, and no major theater chain would show it, but has since become a cult favorite among union activists and on college campuses.</p>
<h2>4. ‘<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0280377/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">10,000 Black Men Named George</a>’ (2002)</h2>
<p>Andre Braugher stars as <a href="https://aflcio.org/about/history/labor-history-people/asa-philip-randolph">A. Philip Randolph</a>, who organized the <a href="https://socialwelfare.library.vcu.edu/eras/great-depression/brotherhood-of-sleeping-car-porters-win-over-pullman-company/">Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters</a>, the first Black-run union. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.npr.org/2009/05/08/103933268/pullman-porters-creating-a-black-middle-class">Being a porter on a Pullman railroad car</a> was one of the few jobs open to Black men. But wages were low, travel was constant and trains’ white passengers patronized the porters by calling all of them “George,” after <a href="https://www.nps.gov/people/george-m-pullman.htm">George Pullman</a>, the mogul who owned the company. </p>
<p>The company hired thugs to intimidate the porters, but Randolph and his top lieutenants persisted. They began their crusade in 1925 but didn’t get the company to sign a contract with the union until 1937, <a href="http://www.pennfedbmwe.org/Docs/reference/RLA_Simplified.html">thanks to a New Deal law</a> that gave railroad workers the right to unionize. Randolph became American’s leading civil rights organizer during the 1940s and 1950s and orchestrated the 1963 March on Washington. </p>
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<img alt="Black men stand on a stage holding an American flag and a union flag." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=586&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=586&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=586&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Members of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters display their banner at a 1955 ceremony celebrating the organization’s 30th anniversary.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/fight-or-be-slaves-members-of-the-brotherhood-of-sleeping-news-photo/515296680?adppopup=true">Bettmann/Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>5. 'North Country’ (2005)</h2>
<p>Charlize Theron portrays Josey Aimes, a desperate single mom who flees her abusive husband, returns to her hometown in northern Minnesota, moves in with her parents and takes a job at an iron mine. </p>
<p>There, she is constantly groped, insulted and bullied by the male workers. She complains to the company managers, who don’t take her seriously. The male-dominated union claims there’s nothing they can do. Aimes sues the company, which, after a dramatic courtroom scene, is forced to settle with her and other women. </p>
<p>With stellar performances by Theron, Sissy Spacek, Frances McDormand and Woody Harrelson, “North Country” is based on <a href="https://www.womenshistory.org/articles/real-women-north-country">a groundbreaking lawsuit</a> brought by female miners at Minnesota’s Eveleth Mines in 1975 that helped make sexual harassment a violation of workers’ rights.</p>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This is an updated version of an article that was <a href="https://theconversation.com/5-unsung-films-that-dramatize-americas-rich-labor-history-188442">first
published</a> on The Conversation on Aug. 22, 2022.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/209824/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Dreier does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As actors join screenwriters in a strike that has shut down movie productions, a labor historian looks back at union action on the silver screen.Peter Dreier, E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of Politics, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2077972023-06-15T17:37:26Z2023-06-15T17:37:26ZCrowdsourcing new constitutions: How 2 Latin American countries increased participation and empowered groups excluded from politics – podcast<p>Over the past few decades, countries across Latin America have witnessed a surge in demands by its people for increased political participation and representation. Colombia and Chile stand out as notable examples of countries responding to these calls with constitutional reform. </p>
<p>Colombia’s 1991 constitution emerged from <a href="http://ips-project.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/The-1991-Colombian-National-Constituent-Assembly.pdf">a backdrop of armed conflict and social unrest</a>. It represented a turning point in the country’s history by acknowledging the multicultural fabric of Colombian society, including Indigenous communities and Afro-Colombian populations.</p>
<p>Likewise in Chile, the government has embarked on a journey of constitutional reform in response to the widespread discontent and social unrest that erupted in 2019. The protests reflected grievances related to inequality, education, health care and pension systems, and a desire to replace the constitution imposed during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. </p>
<p>Under the new government of progressive president Gabriel Boric, <a href="https://theconversation.com/chiles-progressive-new-constitution-rejected-by-voters-after-campaign-marred-by-misinformation-190371">a draft constitution was presented to the people</a>. The draft included progressive elements such as gender parity, Indigenous rights and a restructuring of the parliamentary system to distribute power more evenly. </p>
<p>The draft was ultimately rejected in a referendum in September 2022, although some commentators argue that the process remains a victory for democracy.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/chiles-progressive-new-constitution-rejected-by-voters-after-campaign-marred-by-misinformation-190371">Chile's progressive new constitution rejected by voters after campaign marred by misinformation</a>
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<p>In this week’s episode of <em>The Conversation Weekly</em>, we speak with two researchers about Latin America’s ongoing democratic transition, with a particular focus on the involvement of populations in democratic processes in Colombia and Chile. </p>
<p>We examine how countries are looking to empower their populations through crowdsourcing participation, what the implications of these reforms for marginalized communities are and how Chile’s rejection of a progressive constitution remains a significant step for empowering citizens.</p>
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<h2>Crowdsourcing the constitution</h2>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/carlos-bernal-1447440">Carlos Bernal</a> is a professor of law at the University of Dayton in the United States and commissioner of the America Human Rights Commission. As part of his research, he focuses on what he calls “constitutional crowdsourcing,” a process by which governments gather the opinions, views and demands of their populations in the making of a constitution. </p>
<p>The basic idea is that in a democracy, everyone should have the chance to participate and define the institutions that preside over them. Bernal says, as societies change, so do the social and political values of that society — and this change can be a challenge to a constitution. “If a constitution becomes a stagnant in the past, that constitution is not able, is not relevant anymore.”</p>
<p>To reflect those shifts, countries can either enact legislation to supplement the constitution, or they can specify the meaning of the constitution without changing the wording. But in certain instances, simple amendments of a constitution might not be enough to reflect those social shifts. </p>
<p>“And when there is a big gap between the constitution text and the constitutional reality,” Bernal adds, “the constitution must be replaced to create a new institutional framework that is able to regulate your society.”</p>
<h2>Political inclusion</h2>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/jennifer-m-piscopo-378304">Jennifer Piscopo</a> is an associate professor of politics at Occidental College in Los Angeles, in the United States. Her work focuses on representation, gender quotas and legislative institutions in Latin America, and how countries involve underrepresented groups in political processes. </p>
<p>She says that during Latin America’s democratic transition in the 1980s, “women were very active in the human rights movements that criticized the abuses under authoritarian governments. They were very active in the peace movements that really urged for an end to the conflict in Central America.”</p>
<p>But she says when democratic systems began replacing authoritarian governments, there was a gap between women’s roles as activists and in the democratic transition, versus the kinds of opportunities they had in politics. So when, in September 2022, <a href="https://theconversation.com/chiles-progressive-new-constitution-rejected-by-voters-after-campaign-marred-by-misinformation-190371">the new draft constitution was rejected</a>, many observers were perplexed. Some analysis argued the government’s radically democratic process had been too ambitious.</p>
<p>As a result, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/chile-starts-second-attempt-draft-new-constitution-2023-03-06/">the government initiated a second, more institutional process for drafting a new constitution</a>, which removed certain representational quotas for Indigenous people and women that had characterized the first constitutional process.</p>
<p>But according to Piscopo, although the first draft was rejected, “there is still an appetite for processes that are more open and more democratic. The challenge is, electorates are fickle and how do you hold someone’s attention and someone’s preferences in a stable way as everyday politics is pushing them around?”</p>
<p>Listen to the full episode of <em>The Conversation Weekly</em> to learn more about Latin America’s democratic transition, crowdsourcing constitutional processes, and what their impact means for marginalized groups. </p>
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<p>This episode was written and produced by Mend Mariwany, who is also the executive producer of The Conversation Weekly. Eloise Stevens does our sound design, and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl.</p>
<p>You can find us on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/TC_Audio">@TC_Audio</a>, on Instagram at <a href="https://www.instagram.com/theconversationdotcom/">theconversationdotcom</a> or <a href="mailto:podcast@theconversation.com">via email</a>. You can also subscribe to The Conversation’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/newsletter">free daily email here</a>. </p>
<p>Listen to <em>The Conversation Weekly</em> via any of the apps listed above, download it directly via our <a href="https://feeds.acast.com/public/shows/60087127b9687759d637bade">RSS feed</a> or find out <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-listen-to-the-conversations-podcasts-154131">how else to listen here</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/207797/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jennifer Piscopo does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article. She is a Senior Advisor to the Gender Equity Policy Institute in Los Angeles, United States.
</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Carlos Bernal does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article. He is commissioner of the Inter-American Human Rights Commission.</span></em></p>People across Latin America are demanding greater political participation. Some countries, including Colombia and Chile, have responded by involving citizens in the making of their constitutions.Mend Mariwany, Producer, The Conversation Weekly, The Conversation Weekly PodcastNehal El-Hadi, Science + Technology Editor & Co-Host of The Conversation Weekly Podcast, The ConversationLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1992432023-02-10T22:12:35Z2023-02-10T22:12:35ZWhat to watch for when you are watching the Super Bowl: 5 essential reads<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/509546/original/file-20230210-14-t9c1mn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=16%2C0%2C5380%2C3616&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Clash of the tight ends?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/kansas-city-chiefs-linebacker-ben-niemann-tackles-news-photo/1235721523?phrase=kansas%20chiefs%20Philadelphia&adppopup=true">Kyle Ross/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Super Bowl – an annual celebration of advertising, calorific bar food, Roman numerals and occasional on-field action – is upon us, again.</p>
<p>At 6:30 EST on Feb. 12, 2023, the <a href="https://www.nfl.com/news/super-bowl-lvii-picks-will-kansas-city-chiefs-or-philadelphia-eagles-win-lombard">Kansas City Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles will take the field</a> in Arizona before moments later trundling off for one of the many breaks that are a feature of football. </p>
<p>But there is an upside to all those breaks. It means you can read an article or two from The Conversation’s archive. To that end, below is a selection of stories tackling what is happening in the world of football, but not necessarily on the field.</p>
<h2>A game of wounded warriors</h2>
<p>A specific part of the anatomy of Kansas City star quarterback Patrick Mahomes has been scrutinized in the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl: his right ankle.</p>
<p>You see, despite Mahomes’ being more handy with his hands than with his feet, he still needs to be able to move around with some dexterity to be effective – and Mahomes’ mobility is a key aspect of his game. And on Jan. 21, 2023, the 27-year-old athlete awkwardly fell after a tackle and sprained his ankle.</p>
<p>But what exactly in an ankle sprain? The University of Pittsburgh’s <a href="https://mirm-pitt.net/staff/macalus-v-hogan-md-mba/">MaCalus V. Hogan</a>, a surgeon who specializes in sports-related ankle injuries, <a href="https://theconversation.com/patrick-mahomes-injury-an-ankle-surgeon-explains-what-a-high-ankle-sprain-is-and-how-it-might-affect-mahomes-in-the-super-bowl-199248">explained that they occur</a> when someone rolls an ankle joint, resulting in the stretching or tearing of ligaments that hold the ankle together.</p>
<p>The good news for Chiefs’ fans? Hogan reckons their quarterback will be OK come gametime: “While Mahomes may not be at 100%, given the moderate severity of the injury, his fitness and the high quality of care he is receiving, I expect that he will be ready to play an exciting game come kickoff on Super Bowl Sunday.”</p>
<p>Of much more concern are the life-threatening injuries of the sort that afflicted Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin and Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa earlier in the season. </p>
<p>Both collapsed to the turf after jarring tackles, Hamlin from heart problems, Tagovailoa from a concussion. As paramedics administered treatment on the field, <a href="https://theconversation.com/sports-broadcasters-have-a-duty-to-report-injuries-responsibly-in-the-case-of-nfls-damar-hamlin-they-passed-the-test-197192">broadcasters faced a dilemma</a>, as <a href="https://comm.osu.edu/people/kraft.42">Nicole Kraft of The Ohio State University</a> explained.</p>
<p>“When disaster strikes on a live sports broadcast, it’s easy to say something wrong, especially in an age where words can be distributed widely, dissected and criticized on social media,” wrote Kraft, noting that broadcasters also have a decision to make over whether or not to show replays of the injury.</p>
<p>In the case of Hamlin, ESPN and others behaved responsibly, Kraft concluded. Instead of filling the air with speculation, broadcasters instead appealed to the NFL to suspend the game.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/patrick-mahomes-injury-an-ankle-surgeon-explains-what-a-high-ankle-sprain-is-and-how-it-might-affect-mahomes-in-the-super-bowl-199248">Patrick Mahomes injury: An ankle surgeon explains what a high ankle sprain is and how it might affect Mahomes in the Super Bowl</a>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/sports-broadcasters-have-a-duty-to-report-injuries-responsibly-in-the-case-of-nfls-damar-hamlin-they-passed-the-test-197192">Sports broadcasters have a duty to report injuries responsibly – in the case of NFL's Damar Hamlin, they passed the test</a>
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<hr>
<h2>The rise and pitfalls of sports gambling</h2>
<p>A subplot of this year’s Super Bowl advertising rush is the growing presence of betting companies like DraftKings and FanDuel.</p>
<p>It’s only been five years since the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-legalized-sports-betting-has-transformed-the-fan-experience-194994">Supreme Court opened up legalized sports betting</a> across the states. Since then, “a whole industry has sprouted up that, for tens of millions of fans around the country, is now just part of the show,” wrote <a href="https://www.bellisario.psu.edu/people/individual/john-affleck">Penn State’s John Affleck</a>. He added: “Betting’s seamless integration into American sports – impossible to ignore even among fans who aren’t wagering – represents a remarkable shift for an activity that was banned in much of the country only a few years ago.”</p>
<p>The damage being done by the explosion of easy-to-bet apps and websites is only just being understood. <a href="https://socialwork.rutgers.edu/node/677">Lia Nower</a>, director of The Center for Gambling Studies at Rutgers University, has been tasked by New Jersey to <a href="https://theconversation.com/data-from-new-jersey-is-a-warning-sign-for-young-sports-bettors-197865">evaluate the impact of sports gambling</a> by interviewing gamblers and analyzing every bet placed online in the state since 2018.</p>
<p>She reported that “those wagering on sports in New Jersey were more likely than others who gamble to have high rates of problem gambling and problems with drugs or alcohol, and to experience mental health problems like anxiety and depression. Most alarming, findings suggest that about 14% of sports bettors reported thoughts of suicide, and 10% said they had made a suicide attempt.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-legalized-sports-betting-has-transformed-the-fan-experience-194994">How legalized sports betting has transformed the fan experience</a>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/data-from-new-jersey-is-a-warning-sign-for-young-sports-bettors-197865">Data from New Jersey is a warning sign for young sports bettors</a>
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</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>It really is time to drop the ‘chop’</h2>
<p>Kansas City fans inside the State Farm Stadium in Glendale during the Super Bowl might at various points during the game engage in what is known as the “tomahawk chop.” Outside the stadium, Native Americans intend to protest. What they want – along with an end to that offensive gesture – is a new name for the franchise.</p>
<p>Such re-branding is not, of course, unheard of. Washington’s NFL team dropped its racist moniker in 2020. And last year, the Cleveland Indians changed its name to the Guardians.</p>
<p>But as <a href="https://www.oxy.edu/academics/faculty/peter-dreier">Peter Dreier of Occidental College</a> noted, <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-cleveland-indians-changed-their-team-name-whats-holding-back-the-atlanta-braves-181662">not all teams are on board</a> with jettisoning their problematic names. The Atlanta Braves are one team that refuses to move on, sticking with its name, along with its “tomahawk song” and accompanying crowd gesture.</p>
<p>“Today, many fans – not to mention many Native Americans – cringe at the music and the chop. To them, it reflects a stereotypical image of Native Americans as violent and uncivilized, similar to those that appeared on TV and in movies for many years,” wrotes Dreier.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-cleveland-indians-changed-their-team-name-whats-holding-back-the-atlanta-braves-181662">The Cleveland Indians changed their team name – what's holding back the Atlanta Braves?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/199243/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
As the Kansas City Chiefs prepare to take on the Philadelphia Eagles, The Conversation takes a critical look at some of the biggest news stories from the past NFL season.Matt Williams, Senior International EditorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1988092023-01-30T19:03:48Z2023-01-30T19:03:48ZL’impact des puits de pétrole sur la santé : le cas édifiant de Los Angeles<p>À l’époque où Hollywood n’en était qu’à ses balbutiements, des puits de pétrole pompaient déjà dans les quartiers de Los Angeles. Un siècle plus tard, des milliers de puits actifs parsèment encore la ville.</p>
<p>Souvent implantés à quelques mètres seulement des maisons, des écoles ou des parcs, ces puits peuvent rejeter gaz et produits chimiques irritants et toxiques (benzène…) dans l’air. Aujourd’hui, après quasiment une décennie d’organisation au niveau des collectivités et d’études démontrant les effets néfastes sur la santé des personnes vivant à proximité de ces forages, la longue histoire du forage urbain à Los Angeles touche à sa fin.</p>
<p>Lors d’un <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-01-25/los-angeles-county-blocks-new-oil-wells-mirroring-citywide-ban">vote unanime</a> le 24 janvier 2023, le Conseil des superviseurs du comté de Los Angeles a voté l’interdiction de toute nouvelle extraction de pétrole et de gaz et la suppression progressive des opérations existantes. Cette décision faisait suite à un <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/los-angeles-city-council-votes-ban-oil-gas-94371123">vote similaire</a> du conseil municipal un mois plus tôt.</p>
<p>La ville a fixé une période d’élimination progressive de 20 ans, tandis que le comté n’a pas encore fixé de calendrier.</p>
<p>En tant que <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Bhavna-Shamasunder">chercheurs</a> en <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=t4m6sjAAAAAJ&hl=en">santé environnementale</a>, nous étudions les impacts du forage pétrolier sur les communautés environnantes. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">Nos résultats sont clairs</a> : ils montrent que les <a href="http://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15010138">personnes vivant à proximité d’exploitations pétrolières urbaines</a> souffrent de taux d’asthme plus élevés que la moyenne, de respiration sifflante, d’irritation des yeux et de maux de gorge. Dans certains cas, l’impact sur les poumons des résidents est pire que de vivre à côté d’une autoroute ou d’être exposé à la fumée secondaire tous les jours.</p>
<h2>Quand Los Angeles était une forêt… de derricks</h2>
<p>Il y a plus d’un siècle, la <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3985379">première industrie à connaître un essor</a> à Los Angeles était le pétrole.</p>
<p>C’était alors une ressource abondante, présente en surface ou peu s’en fallait. Dans la Californie du début du XX<sup>e</sup> siècle, l’extraction des minéraux était régie par des lois disparates ; pour le pétrole, le premier à forer ramassait la mise et les droits d’exploitation. Cela a marqué le début d’une période de forage effréné, avec la multiplication anarchique des puits et équipements associés.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Une photo historique en noir et blanc montrant une rue avec des maisons, de vieilles voitures et des dizaines de derricks pétroliers sur la colline derrière elles" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">En 1924, les derricks formaient une véritable forêt au niveau de la municipalité de Signal Hill (Los Angeles).</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_City_Views%20(1925%20+).html">Water and Power Museum Archive</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Au milieu des années 1920, la cité des Anges était ainsi l’une des <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3985379?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents">plus grandes régions exportatrices de pétrole au monde</a>.</p>
<p>Une décennie plus tard, les installations pétrolières étaient tellement omniprésentes que le Los Angeles Times les décrivait, en 1930, comme <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jas079">« des arbres dans une forêt »</a>.</p>
<p>Si la classe ouvrière a d’abord soutenu cette industrie parce qu’elle promettait des emplois, elle s’y est ensuite <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3985379">opposée</a> lorsque leurs quartiers ont commencé à en être victimes – des « villes sacrifiées sur l’autel du pétrole ». Dès les années 1920, les premières pollutions sont observées. Certains sont les témoins d’explosions, de déversements de pétrole ainsi que de <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-004-1159-0">dommages à plus long terme pour la terre, l’eau et la santé</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Une vieille photo en noir et blanc d’une montagne russe sur une jetée, avec la ville derrière elle et ensuite une longue rangée de derricks pétroliers derrière cela sur une crête" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">En 1940, les derricks recouvrent encore les reliefs surplombant le parc d’attractions The Pike et le centre-ville de Long Beach, Californie.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_City_Views%20(1925%20+).html">Water and Power Museum Archive</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Les tensions autour de l’utilisation des terres, les droits d’extraction et les chutes ultérieures des prix du pétrole dues à la surproduction ont finalement abouti à des restrictions sur le forage. S’est alors mise en place une pratique <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jas079">d’« autorégulation volontaire » des compagnies pétrolières</a> pour limiter pertes financières et nuisances humaines, avec par exemple le développement de technologies de réduction du bruit. L’industrie a commencé à vanter ces approches volontaires pour détourner la réglementation gouvernementale.</p>
<p>De plus en plus, les compagnies pétrolières ont aussi cherché à camoufler leurs activités. Par exemple, en installant leurs infrastructures d’exploitation <a href="https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/hidden-oil-wells/">à l’intérieur de bâtiments, derrière de grands murs</a> ou <a href="https://lbbusinessjournal.com/thums-oil-islands-half-a-century-later-still-unique-still-iconic">sur des îles artificielles au large de Long Beach</a> – ou par tout autre moyen leur permettant de se fondre dans le paysage. Toujours présent, le forage pétrolier était désormais caché à la vue de tous.</p>
<p>[<em>Près de 80 000 lecteurs font confiance à la newsletter de The Conversation pour mieux comprendre les grands enjeux du monde</em>. <a href="https://theconversation.com/fr/newsletters/la-newsletter-quotidienne-5?utm_source=inline-70ksignup">Abonnez-vous aujourd’hui</a>]</p>
<p>Depuis les années 2000, l’industrie pétrolière connaît un nouvel essor. Les progrès des techniques d’extraction ont en effet permis d’accéder à des gisements jusque-là complexes à atteindre… ce qui a entraîné une relance des activités. Certains secteurs ont été particulièrement touchés par cette réaccélération de l’extraction. Les habitants de South Los Angeles et d’autres quartiers situés dans des champs pétrolifères ont ainsi remarqué de fréquentes <a href="https://www.latimes.com/local/la-xpm-2013-sep-21-la-me-0922-oil-20130922-story.html">odeurs chimiques, des saignements de nez chez les enfants et maux de tête</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Silhouette d’un élève avec un sac à dos passe devant un derrick pétrolier couvert de dessins de fleurs à l’extérieur d’une école" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">La Beverly Hills High School a gagné de l’argent grâce à un puits de pétrole caché derrière des murs couverts de dessins. Elle a fonctionné jusqu’en 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/decorative-flowery-exterior-masks-an-oil-rig-along-olympic-news-photo/566019401">Luis Sinco/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Les conséquences pour la santé</h2>
<p>Aujourd’hui, on compte plus de 20 000 puits actifs, inactifs ou abandonnés, répartis dans un comté de 10 millions d’habitants.</p>
<p>Près d’un <a href="https://news.usc.edu/184929/urban-oil-wells-drilling-lung-health-los-angeles-usc-research/">tiers des résidents</a> vit à moins de 2km d’un site actif, quand il n’est pas <a href="https://maps.conservation.ca.gov/doggr/wellfinder/#openModal/-118.23225/33.87983/12">sur le pas de leur porte</a>. Environ <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">75 % des puits de pétrole ou de gaz actifs sont situés à moins de 500 mètres</a> de zones d’« utilisation sensible des sols », telles que les habitations, les écoles, les garderies, les parcs ou les résidences pour personnes âgées.</p>
<p>Or la ville de Los Angeles ne prévoit aucune zone tampon ou de retrait entre l’extraction pétrolière et les habitations.</p>
<p>Malgré plus d’un siècle de forage pétrolier, il n’y avait jusqu’à récemment que peu de recherches sur ses effets sur la santé. Travailler avec des <a href="https://envhealthcenters.usc.edu/2021/04/harnessing-the-expertise-of-community-health-workers-for-environmental-health-research.html">agents de santé communautaires</a> et des organisations locales nous a permis de mesurer l’impact des puits de pétrole sur les résidents, en particulier sur ses quartiers historiquement noirs et hispaniques.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cSfXx7cMNWc?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Forages pétroliers à Los Angeles.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>La première étape de notre enquête a consisté à mettre en place un porte-à-porte dans le secteur situé à proximité des puits du champ pétrolier de Las Cienegas (South Los Angeles), situé au sud et à l’ouest du centre-ville. Nous avons interrogé 813 personnes, habitant 203 foyers. Ensuite, nous avons mesuré la fonction pulmonaire de 747 résidents à long terme, âgés de 10 à 85 ans, vivant à proximité de deux sites de forage.</p>
<p>Près de la moitié de nos interlocuteurs, soit 45 %, ne savaient pas que des puits de pétrole étaient exploités à proximité. 63 % ne savaient pas comment contacter les autorités réglementaires locales pour signaler des odeurs ou des risques environnementaux.</p>
<p>Nos constats en termes de santé pour ces populations sont clairs :</p>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>L’<a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15010138">asthme les touche plus fréquemment</a></strong> que chez les résidents de <a href="https://ask.chis.ucla.edu">l’ensemble du comté de Los Angeles</a>.</p></li>
<li><p><strong>Leur fonction pulmonaire est plus faible</strong>. Plus une personne vit près d’un site de forage (actif ou récemment mis à l’arrêt), <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">plus sa fonction pulmonaire est faible</a>, même après ajustement d’autres facteurs de risque – tabagisme, asthme, proximité d’une autoroute, etc. Les individus vivant jusqu’à 1 km sous le vent d’un site de forage sont plus touchés en moyenne que ceux vivant plus loin et contre le vent. L’impact est similaire à celui d’une autoroute ou, pour les femmes, d’être exposées au tabagisme passif. Pour établir ces résultats, nous avons étudié deux critères : la capacité pulmonaire (quantité d’air que l’on peut expirer après une profonde inspiration) et la force pulmonaire (avec laquelle on peut expirer). Toutes deux sont des indicateurs de <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10654-012-9750-2">maladies respiratoires, de décès dus à des problèmes cardiovasculaires</a> ou de tous les <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/thorax.58.5.388">décès précoces en général</a>.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>Nos travaux montrent donc une relation significative entre vivre près de puits de pétrole et détérioration de la santé pulmonaire.</p>
<p>Nous avons également trouvé des <a href="https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acs.est.2c04926">preuves</a> que les contaminants liés au pétrole, y compris les métaux toxiques comme le nickel et le manganèse, pénètrent dans le corps humain. La contamination locale peut donc parfaitement frapper les communautés vivant à proximité des installations pétrolières.</p>
<p><iframe id="g7Qgh" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/g7Qgh/7/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Grâce à un réseau de surveillance installé dans le sud de Los Angeles, nous avons pu <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2020.117519">identifier la pollution spécifiquement liée au pétrole</a> dans les quartiers proches des puits.</p>
<p>Nos capteurs <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.146194">situés à moins de 500 mètres des sites pétroliers</a> ont mesuré l’émission de brefs pics de polluants atmosphériques et de méthane (puissant gaz à effet de serre). Lorsque la <a href="https://doi.org/10.1039/D1EM00048A">production de pétrole sur un site est arrêtée</a>, nous observons par contre des réductions significatives de toxines (benzène, toluène, n-hexane…) dans l’air des quartiers adjacents.</p>
<p>Ces <a href="https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/ToxProfiles/tp123-p.pdf">produits chimiques</a> sont des irritants, des cancérigènes et sont connus pour être toxiques pour la reproduction. Ils sont également associés à des étourdissements, des maux de tête, de la fatigue, des tremblements et une irritation du système respiratoire, y compris des difficultés à respirer et, à des niveaux plus élevés, une altération de la fonction pulmonaire.</p>
<h2>Des populations à risques</h2>
<p>Une large proportion des dizaines de puits de pétrole actifs dans le sud de Los Angeles se trouvent dans des communautés historiquement noires et hispaniques, qui ont été marginalisées pendant des décennies. Ces quartiers sont déjà considérés comme faisant partie des <a href="https://oehha.ca.gov/calenviroscreen/report/calenviroscreen-30">plus pollués, avec les résidents les plus vulnérables</a> de l’État, et devant faire face à de <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35780656/">multiples facteurs de stress environnementaux et sociaux</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Carte montrant les sites de puits actifs" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Une application de l’État appelée Well Finder localise les puits de pétrole actifs. Le gouverneur Gavin Newsom a proposé de supprimer progressivement l’extraction du pétrole dans tout l’État d’ici 2045.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://maps.conservation.ca.gov/doggr/wellfinder/#openModal/-118.00909/33.92186/12">State of California 2022</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Le calendrier de la ville pour l’élimination progressive des puits existants est fixé à 20 ans, ce qui suscite des inquiétudes quant aux effets sanitaires persistants pendant cette période. Ces quartiers ont besoin d’une attention soutenue pour réduire les effets déjà mesurés. Et la ville elle-même a besoin d’un plan pour une transition juste et un nettoyage des champs de pétrole au fur et à mesure de la transition vers de nouvelles utilisations.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198809/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jill Johnston a reçu des financements du National Institutes of Environmental Health Sciences.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bhavna Shamasunder a reçu des financements du National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences et du 11th Hour Project.</span></em></p>20 000 puits, actifs ou abandonnés, polluent Los Angeles. Longtemps ignorés, les problèmes de santé des populations commencent à être documentés. Des résultats qui posent des questions mondiales.Jill Johnston, Associate Professor of Population and Public Health Sciences, University of Southern CaliforniaBhavna Shamasunder, Associate Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1986502023-01-27T13:27:37Z2023-01-27T13:27:37ZLA’s long, troubled history with urban oil drilling is nearing an end after years of health concerns<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506677/original/file-20230126-12-fuo62g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=31%2C31%2C2896%2C1962&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Active oil wells can often be found next door to homes, office buildings and even schools.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/jet-lands-at-los-angeles-international-airport-as-oil-rigs-news-photo/80864709">David McNew/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/limpact-des-puits-de-petrole-sur-la-sante-le-cas-edifiant-de-los-angeles-198809">Lire cet article en français</a></em></p>
<p>Los Angeles had oil wells pumping in its neighborhoods when Hollywood was in its infancy, and thousands of active wells still dot the city.</p>
<p>These wells can emit toxic chemicals such as benzene and other irritants into the air, often just feet from homes, schools and parks. But now, after nearly a decade of community organizing and studies demonstrating the adverse health impacts on people living nearby, Los Angeles’ long history with urban drilling is nearing an end.</p>
<p>In a <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-01-25/los-angeles-county-blocks-new-oil-wells-mirroring-citywide-ban">unanimous vote</a> on Jan. 24, 2023, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted to ban new oil and gas extraction and phase out existing operations. It followed a <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/los-angeles-city-council-votes-ban-oil-gas-94371123">similar vote</a> by the Los Angeles City Council a month earlier. The city set a 20-year phaseout period, while the county has yet to set a timetable.</p>
<p>As <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=t4m6sjAAAAAJ&hl=en">environmental health</a> <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Bhavna-Shamasunder">researchers</a>, we study the impacts of oil drilling on surrounding communities. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">Our research</a> shows that <a href="http://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15010138">people living near these urban oil operations</a> suffer higher rates of asthma than average, as well as wheezing, eye irritation and sore throats. In some cases, the impact on residents’ lungs is worse than living beside a highway or being exposed to secondhand smoke every day. </p>
<h2>LA was once an oil town with forests of derricks</h2>
<p>Over a century ago, the <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3985379">first industry to boom</a> in Los Angeles was oil. </p>
<p>Oil was abundant and flowed close to the surface. In early 20th-century California, sparse laws governed mineral extraction, and rights to oil accrued to those who could pull it out of the ground first. This ushered in a period of rampant drilling, with wells and associated machinery crisscrossing the landscape. By the mid-1920s, Los Angeles was one of the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3985379?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents">largest oil-exporting regions</a> in the world. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A historic black-and-white photo shows a street with houses, old cars and dozens of oil derricks on the hill behind them." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A 1924 photo shows the oil derricks on Signal Hill.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_City_Views%20(1925%20+).html">Water and Power Museum Archive</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An old black-and-white photo of a roller coaster on a pier, with the city behind it and then a long row of oil derricks behind that on a ridge." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The view across The Pike amusement park and downtown Long Beach, California, in 1940 shows a forest of oil derricks in the background.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_City_Views%20(1925%20+).html">Water and Power Museum Archive</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Oil rigs were so pervasive across the region that the Los Angeles Times described them in 1930 as “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jas079">trees in a forest</a>.” Working-class communities were initially supportive of the industry because it promised jobs but later <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3985379">pushed back</a> as their neighborhoods witnessed explosions and oil spills, along with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-004-1159-0">longer-term damage to land, water and human health</a>.</p>
<p>Tensions over land use, extraction rights and subsequent drops in oil prices due to overproduction eventually resulted in curbs on drilling and a long-standing practice of oil companies’ voluntary “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jas079">self-regulation</a>,” such as noise-reduction technologies. The industry began touting these voluntary approaches to deflect governmental regulation.</p>
<p>Increasingly, oil companies disguised their activities with approaches such as operating <a href="https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/hidden-oil-wells/">inside buildings, building tall walls</a> and <a href="https://lbbusinessjournal.com/thums-oil-islands-half-a-century-later-still-unique-still-iconic">designing islands off Long Beach</a> and other sites to blend in with the landscape. Oil drilling was hidden in plain sight. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A silhouetted student with a backpack walks past an oil derrick covered with drawings of flowers outside a school." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Beverly Hills High School earned money from an oil well, hidden behind walls covered with drawings, that operated until 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/decorative-flowery-exterior-masks-an-oil-rig-along-olympic-news-photo/566019401">Luis Sinco/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Today there are over 20,000 active, idle or abandoned wells spread across a county of 10 million people. About <a href="https://news.usc.edu/184929/urban-oil-wells-drilling-lung-health-los-angeles-usc-research/">one-third of residents</a> live less than a mile from an active well site, <a href="https://maps.conservation.ca.gov/doggr/wellfinder/#openModal/-118.23225/33.87983/12">some right next door</a>.</p>
<p>Since the 2000s, the advance of extractive technologies to access harder-to-reach deposits has led to a resurgence of oil extraction activities. As extraction in some neighborhoods has ramped up, people living in South Los Angeles and other neighborhoods in oil fields have noticed frequent <a href="https://www.latimes.com/local/la-xpm-2013-sep-21-la-me-0922-oil-20130922-story.html">odors, nosebleeds and headaches</a>. </p>
<h2>Closer to urban oil drilling, poorer lung function</h2>
<p>The city of Los Angeles has no buffers or setbacks between oil extraction and homes, and approximately <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">75% of active oil or gas wells are located within 500 meters</a> (1,640 feet) of “sensitive land uses,” such as homes, schools, child care facilities, parks or senior residential facilities. </p>
<p>Despite over a century of oil drilling in Los Angeles, until recently there was limited research into the health impacts. Working with <a href="https://envhealthcenters.usc.edu/2021/04/harnessing-the-expertise-of-community-health-workers-for-environmental-health-research.html">community health workers</a> and community-based organizations helped us gauge the impact oil wells are having on residents, particularly on its historically Black and Hispanic neighborhoods.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cSfXx7cMNWc?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Oil drilling in Los Angeles.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The first step was a door-to-door survey of 813 neighbors from 203 households near wells in Las Cienegas oil field, just south and west of downtown. We found that <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15010138">asthma</a> was significantly more common among people living near South Los Angeles oil wells than among residents of <a href="https://ask.chis.ucla.edu">Los Angeles County as a whole</a>. Nearly half the people we spoke with, 45%, didn’t know oil wells were operating nearby, and 63% didn’t know how to contact local regulatory authorities to report odors or environmental hazards. </p>
<p>Next, we measured lung function of 747 long-term residents, ages 10 to 85, living near two drilling sites. Poor lung capacity, measured as the amount of air a person can exhale after taking a deep breath, and lung strength, how strongly the person can exhale, and are both predictors of health problems including <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10654-012-9750-2">respiratory disease, death from cardiovascular problems</a> and <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/thorax.58.5.388">early death in general</a>.</p>
<p>We found that the closer someone lived to an active or recently idle well site, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">the poorer that person’s lung function</a>, even after adjusting for such other risk factors as smoking, asthma and living near a freeway. This research demonstrates a significant relationship between living near oil wells and worsened lung health.</p>
<p>People living up to 1,000 meters (0.6 miles) downwind of a well site showed lower lung function on average than those living farther away and upwind. The effect on their lungs’ capacity and strength was similar to impacts of living near a freeway or, for women, being exposed to secondhand smoke.</p>
<p>We found <a href="https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acs.est.2c04926">evidence</a> that oil-related contaminants, including toxic metals such as nickel and manganese, are getting into the bodies of the neighbors. This indicates contamination may be getting into the community. </p>
<p><iframe id="g7Qgh" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/g7Qgh/7/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Using a community monitoring network in South Los Angeles, we were able to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2020.117519">distinguish oil-related pollution</a> in neighborhoods near wells. We found short-term spikes of air pollutants and methane, a potent greenhouse gas, at monitors <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.146194">less than 500 meters, about one-third of a mile, from oil sites</a>.</p>
<p>When oil production at a site <a href="https://doi.org/10.1039/D1EM00048A">stopped</a>, we observed significant reductions in such toxins as benzene, toluene and n-hexane in the air in adjacent neighborhoods. These <a href="https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/ToxProfiles/tp123-p.pdf">chemicals</a> are known irritants, carcinogens and reproductive toxins. They are also associated with dizziness, headaches, fatigue, tremors and respiratory system irritation, including difficulty breathing and, at higher levels, impaired lung function. </p>
<h2>Vulnerable communities at risk</h2>
<p>Many of the dozens of active oil wells in South Los Angeles are in historically Black and Hispanic communities that have been marginalized for decades. These neighborhoods are already considered among the <a href="https://oehha.ca.gov/calenviroscreen/report/calenviroscreen-30">most highly polluted, with the most vulnerable residents</a> in the state. Residents contend with <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35780656/">multiple environmental and social stressors</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Map showing active well sites." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A state app called Well Finder locates active oil wells. Gov. Gavin Newsom has proposed phasing out oil extraction statewide by 2045.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://maps.conservation.ca.gov/doggr/wellfinder/#openModal/-118.00909/33.92186/12">State of California 2022</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The city’s timeline for phasing out existing wells is set for 20 years, leaving concerns about continuing health effects during this period. We believe these neighborhoods need sustained attention to reduce the existing health effects, and the city needs a plan for a just transition and cleanup of the oil fields as the areas transition to new uses.</p>
<p><em>This updates an <a href="https://theconversation.com/los-angeles-long-troubled-history-with-urban-oil-drilling-is-nearing-an-end-after-years-of-health-concerns-175983">article</a> originally published Feb. 3, 2022.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198650/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jill Johnston receives funding from the National Institutes of Environmental Health Sciences. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bhavna Shamasunder receives funding from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the 11th Hour Project.</span></em></p>The Los Angeles area has over 20,000 active, idle or abandoned oil wells. The city and county have voted to ban new ones after studies showed health problems in residents living nearby.Jill Johnston, Associate Professor of Population and Public Health Sciences, University of Southern CaliforniaBhavna Shamasunder, Associate Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1884422022-08-22T17:36:56Z2022-08-22T17:36:56Z5 unsung films that dramatize America’s rich labor history<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/480123/original/file-20220819-3561-cpqei8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C1%2C613%2C471&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'The Salt of the Earth,' made during the height of the post-World War II Red Scare, was blacklisted.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047443/mediaviewer/rm2354993408?ref_=ttmi_mi_all_sf_38">IMDB</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/354455/approval-labor-unions-highest-point-1965.aspx">Unions are more popular now than at any time since 1965</a>, and the U.S. is in the midst of a new upsurge of union organizing. Is a Hollywood drama about angry Starbucks baristas or frustrated Amazon warehouse workers far behind?</p>
<p>Hollywood studios and independent producers have long depicted the collective efforts of working people to improve their lives and gain a voice in their workplaces and the larger society.</p>
<p>Some of the most well-known labor movies champion the struggle of the everyday worker: “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0027977/">Modern Times</a>,” released in 1936, stars Charlie Chaplin going crazy due to his job on an assembly line. It features the famous image of Chaplin caught in the gears of factory machinery. “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0032551/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">The Grapes of Wrath</a>,” a 1940 adaptation of John Steinbeck’s novel, tells the story of sharecropper Tom Joad’s radicalization after his family and other migrant workers experience destitute conditions in California’s growing fields and overcrowded migrant camps. </p>
<p>1979’s “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079638/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">Norma Rae</a>,” is based on the life of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/15/us/15sutton.html">Crystal Lee Sutton</a>, who worked in a J.P. Stevens mill in North Carolina. The textile worker and single mom inspires her fellow workers to overcome their racial animus and work together to vote in a union. “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0212826/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">Bread and Roses</a>,” a 2000 film about low-wage janitors in Los Angeles, is based on the Service Employees International Union’s “<a href="https://www.labor.ucla.edu/what-we-do/research-tools/campaigns-and-research/justice-for-janitors/">Justice for Janitors</a> movement.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">In an iconic scene from ‘Modern Times,’ Charlie Chaplin gets caught in the gears of factory machinery.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There’s also an anti-labor strain of Hollywood history, particularly during <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691153964/the-second-red-scare-and-the-unmaking-of-the-new-deal-left">the post-World War II Red Scare</a>, when studios purged left-wing writers, directors and actors through <a href="https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/insights/hollywoods-red-scare-spread-stigma-association">an industrywide blacklist</a>. Red Scare-era releases such as 1952’s "Big Jim McLain” and the 1954 film “On the Waterfront” often depicted unions as corrupt or infiltrated by communist subversives.</p>
<p>When I teach labor history, I’ve used films to supplement books and articles. I’ve found that students more easily grasp the human dimensions of workers’ lives and struggles when they are depicted on the screen. </p>
<p>Here are five unsung labor movies, all based on real-life events, that, in my view, deserve more attention. </p>
<h2>1. ‘<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078008/?ref_=fn_tt_tt_6">Northern Lights</a>’ (1978)</h2>
<p>This is a fictionalized account of a fascinating but little-known political movement: <a href="https://www.history.nd.gov/ndhistory/npl.html">the Non-Partisan League</a>, which organized farmers in the upper Midwest in the early 1900s. </p>
<p>During this period, Midwestern farmers worked long hours to harvest grain that they were then forced to sell for low prices to elevators, while paying high prices to the big railroad companies and banks. Economic insecurity was a part of life, and foreclosures were routine. </p>
<p>The film follows Ray Sorenson, a young farmer influenced by socialist ideas who leaves his North Dakota farm to become a Non-Partisan League organizer. In his beat-up Model T, he travels the back roads, talking to farmers in their fields or around the potbellied stoves of country stores. He eventually persuades skeptical farmers that electing NPL candidates could get the government to create cooperative grain elevators, state-chartered banks with farmers as stockholders, and limits on the prices that railroads can charge farmers to haul their wheat. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Northern Lights’ is based on an early-20th-century farmer-led political uprising in the Midwest.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 1916, the Non-Partisan League did, in fact, elect farmer <a href="https://www.history.nd.gov/exhibits/governors/governors12.html">Lynn Frazier</a> as governor of North Dakota with 79% of the vote. Two years later, the NPL won control of both houses of the state legislature and created the North Dakota Mill, still the only state-owned flour mill, and the <a href="https://ilsr.org/rule/bank-of-north-dakota-2/">The Bank of North Dakota</a>, which remains the nation’s only government-owned general-service bank.</p>
<h2>2. ‘<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0033533/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">The Devil and Miss Jones</a>’ (1941)</h2>
<p>In this screwball comedy with a pro-union twist, Charles Coburn plays John P. Merrick, a fictional New York City department store owner.</p>
<p>After his employees hang him in effigy, the tycoon goes undercover to ferret out the agitators of a union drive led by a store clerk in the shoe department and a union organizer. </p>
<p>As he learns more about their lives, Merrick grows sympathetic to his workers – and even falls in love with one of his employees – none of whom know his true identity. As the workers prepare to go on strike, and even picket his house, Merrick reveals that he owns the store and agrees to their demands over pay and hours – and even marries the employee he’s fallen for. </p>
<p>The film was likely inspired by <a href="http://msr-archives.rutgers.edu/archives/Issue%2016/essays/Opler.htm">the 1937 sit-down strikes</a> by employees of New York City’s department stores. </p>
<h2>3. 'Salt of the Earth’ (1954)</h2>
<p>Decades ahead of its time, this story of New Mexico mine workers deals with issues of racism, sexism and class.</p>
<p>After a mine accident, the Mexican-American workers decide to strike. They demand better safety standards and equal treatment, since white miners are allowed to work in pairs, while Mexican ones are forced to work alone. The strikers expect the women to stay at home, cook and take care of the children. But when the company gets an injunction to end the men’s protest, the women step up and maintain the picket lines, earning greater respect from the men.</p>
<p>Made at the height of the Red Scare, the film’s writer, producer and director <a href="https://www.highonfilms.com/salt-of-the-earth-1954-essay/">had been blacklisted</a> for their leftist sympathies, so the film was sponsored by the International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers, not a Hollywood studio. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002095/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">Will Geer</a>, a blacklisted actor who later portrayed Grandpa Walton on the TV drama “The Waltons,” played the repressive sheriff. Mexican actress Rosaura Revueltas played the leader of the wives. The other characters were portrayed by real miners and their wives who participated in the strike against <a href="https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/empire-zinc-strike/">the Empire Zinc Company</a>, which served as the inspiration for the film. </p>
<p>The film itself was blacklisted, and no major theater chain would show it.</p>
<h2>4. ‘<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0280377/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0">10,000 Black Men Named George</a>’ (2002)</h2>
<p>Andre Braugher stars as <a href="https://aflcio.org/about/history/labor-history-people/asa-philip-randolph">A. Philip Randolph</a>, who organized the <a href="https://socialwelfare.library.vcu.edu/eras/great-depression/brotherhood-of-sleeping-car-porters-win-over-pullman-company/">Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters</a>, the first Black-run union. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.npr.org/2009/05/08/103933268/pullman-porters-creating-a-black-middle-class">Being a porter on a Pullman railroad car</a> was one of the few jobs open to Black men. But wages were low, travel was constant and trains’ white passengers patronized the porters by calling all of them “George,” after <a href="https://www.nps.gov/people/george-m-pullman.htm">George Pullman</a>, the mogul who owned the company. </p>
<p>The company hired thugs to intimidate the porters, but Randolph and his top lieutenants persisted. They began their crusade in 1925 but didn’t get the company to sign a contract with the union until 1937, <a href="http://www.pennfedbmwe.org/Docs/reference/RLA_Simplified.html">thanks to a New Deal law</a> that gave railroad workers the right to unionize. Randolph became American’s leading civil rights organizer during the 1940s and 1950s and orchestrated the 1963 March on Washington. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Black men stand on a stage holding an American flag and a union flag." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=586&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=586&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/480118/original/file-20220819-26-jduttq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=586&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Members of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters display their banner at a 1955 ceremony celebrating the organization’s 30th anniversary.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/fight-or-be-slaves-members-of-the-brotherhood-of-sleeping-news-photo/515296680?adppopup=true">Bettmann/Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>4. 'North Country’ (2005)</h2>
<p>Charlize Theron portrays Josey Aimes, a desperate single mom who flees her abusive husband, returns to her hometown in northern Minnesota, moves in with her parents and takes a job at an iron mine. </p>
<p>There, she is constantly groped, insulted and bullied by the male workers. She complains to the company managers, who don’t take her seriously. The male-dominated union claims there’s nothing they can do. Aimes sues the company, which, after a dramatic courtroom scene, is forced to settle with her and other women. </p>
<p>With stellar performances by Theron, Sissy Spacek, Frances McDormand and Woody Harrelson, “North Country” is based on <a href="https://www.womenshistory.org/articles/real-women-north-country">a groundbreaking lawsuit</a> brought by women miners at Minnesota’s Eveleth Mines in 1975 that helped make sexual harassment a violation of workers’ rights.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/188442/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Dreier does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Inspired by real events, the films tackle issues of race, gender and class in ways that will resonate with many of today’s viewers.Peter Dreier, E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of Politics, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1821132022-06-28T11:56:49Z2022-06-28T11:56:49ZMale judges are more likely to hire women as clerks after working with female judges<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/464415/original/file-20220520-25-zv3qps.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C15%2C5112%2C2858&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Although the legal landscape is changing, bias still slows career advancements for women and people of color.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/court-of-law-trial-in-session-portrait-of-honorable-royalty-free-image/1346156695?adppopup=true">gorodenkoff/iStock via Getty Images Plus</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Despite <a href="https://erikhurst.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/HHJK_final.pdf">substantial gains</a> over the past half-century in the numbers of women working in law, medicine and business in the U.S., the elite ranks of these professions <a href="https://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/-/media/faculty/marianne-bertrand/research/the-glass-ceiling_112117.pdf">remain male dominated</a>, a phenomenon often referred to as the “glass ceiling.” </p>
<p>In corporate America, <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/naomicahn/2021/02/19/womens-status-and-pay-in-the-c-suite--new-study/?sh=2b6d122e3762">male executives outnumber women</a> 7 to 1 – and CEOs, 17 to 1. In the judiciary, <a href="https://www.americanprogress.org/article/examining-demographic-compositions-u-s-circuit-district-courts/">only about a quarter of federal appellate judges are women</a>, even though half of law school graduates are women. Because of this lack of diversity, powerful decision-makers may <a href="https://theconversation.com/fishing-strip-clubs-and-golf-how-male-focused-networking-in-medicine-blocks-female-colleagues-from-top-jobs-179931">only rarely collaborate with female peers</a>.</p>
<p>This lack of interaction may <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/bpp.2018.25">reinforce biases</a> – both explicitly held prejudices and implicit assumptions, or ones that people may not realize that they are making. Biases held by established professionals who control hiring can, in turn, limit access to valuable opportunities for women who are just starting their careers. </p>
<p>I am a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=VVNZIowAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">labor economist</a> who studies the gender wage gap and this raised an important question for me: Does working with peers from underrepresented backgrounds lead established professionals to change their attitudes or actions, including making more inclusive decisions when hiring staff?</p>
<h2>Why study high-level courts?</h2>
<p>Working with co-authors <a href="https://www.epatacchini.com/">Eleonora Patacchini</a> and <a href="http://www.mbattaglini.com/">Marco Battaglini</a>, I analyzed the gender gap within the federal appellate court system. We collected data from 2007 to 2017 on which judges heard cases together in each year, and combined it with data on the law clerks that each judge hired. This let us see whether judges are more likely to hire women in years where they have heard many cases with their female colleagues.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/464423/original/file-20220520-23-ioetsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Exterior of a courthouse in Columbia, South Carolina. The sign in the foreground says: South Carolina Court of Appeals." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/464423/original/file-20220520-23-ioetsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/464423/original/file-20220520-23-ioetsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/464423/original/file-20220520-23-ioetsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/464423/original/file-20220520-23-ioetsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/464423/original/file-20220520-23-ioetsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/464423/original/file-20220520-23-ioetsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/464423/original/file-20220520-23-ioetsk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">In U.S. appellate courts, it is not uncommon for a panel of male and female judges to work together on a case.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/south-carolina-court-of-appeals-in-columbia-royalty-free-image/157571941?adppopup=true">thepixelchef/E! via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The <a href="https://www.uscourts.gov/about-federal-courts/court-role-and-structure/about-us-courts-appeals">appellate courts</a> offer unique insights into a high-level work environment. Appellate judges review decisions from lower courts to make sure that the law was correctly applied. To ensure fairness, each case is heard by a panel of at least three judges. </p>
<p>These panels are constructed through a lottery system, chosen from a list of available judges. As a result, the colleagues that judges work with do not reflect the judge’s attitudes, preferences or potential biases.</p>
<p>However, each judge chooses their own staff. Appellate judges hire law clerks to do legal research and help write opinions. These clerkships, typically filled by the best-performing graduates from prestigious law schools, are crucial steppingstones to roles in the judiciary and the legal profession as a whole. A judge’s hiring decisions reflect their personal assessment of a candidate’s ability to serve as a clerk – and to honorably represent the judge later in their career.</p>
<p>These key entry-level positions were <a href="https://www.abajournal.com/news/article/first-female-clerk-to-a-federal-appeals-judge-dies-at-the-age-of-94">historically open only to men</a> and remain male dominated. We find that women are still 33% less likely than men to land an appellate clerkship. That’s not due to a lack of interested female applicants – we found that women were about 50% more likely than men to get slightly less prestigious clerkships in federal district courts. </p>
<h2>Diversity increases diversity</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/720392">Our study found</a> that men were much more likely to hire female clerks in years when they had worked with more female colleagues. We estimate that when male judges worked on 30% of cases with women – rather than 20% – their likelihood of hiring a female clerk jumped by seven percentage points. This difference is statistically significant at the 0.005 level.</p>
<p>This suggests that diversity at the top of a profession can profoundly benefit those at the entry level. We estimate that increasing the prevalence of female appellate judges serving on the bench by just 16% – from <a href="https://www.americanprogress.org/article/examining-demographic-compositions-u-s-circuit-district-courts/">the current 25%</a> to 41% – would completely eliminate the gender disparity in appellate clerkships.</p>
<p>President Joe Biden has appointed a historically diverse slate of federal judges, including the nation’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/ketanji-brown-jackson-confirmed-as-supreme-court-justice-4-essential-reads-180838">first Black female Supreme Court justice</a>. This administration’s appointees are <a href="https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-biden-is-reshaping-the-courts/">far more diverse than those of any previous president</a>, including Democratic predecessors: 71% are nonwhite and 75% are women. Our findings suggest that these changes are likely to reshape the courts for generations to come.</p>
<h2>Overcoming bias</h2>
<p>Our research offers strong, concrete evidence that working closely with diverse peers influences the hiring decisions of established professionals. </p>
<p>While our work focuses on the judiciary, we think this lesson is likely to hold true in most fields. For appellate judges, deciding cases involves teamwork and collaboration that is similar to the collaborative process used in many other professions.</p>
<p>As a result, we expect that if the leadership in most workplaces more closely reflected the makeup of the U.S. – with more women and more racial, religious and ethnic representation – diverse young professionals would have better opportunities in law, business, science, medicine and beyond.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/182113/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>This work was supported by a grant from the Cornell Institute for Social Sciences (ISS_ATF_F17).</span></em></p>A new study reveals a reliable pathway to make U.S. courtrooms – and senior-level positions – more diverse.Jorgen Harris, Assistant Professor of Economics, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1817002022-04-28T12:21:09Z2022-04-28T12:21:09ZHow race and religion have always played a role in who gets refuge in the US<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/460113/original/file-20220427-24-2rper9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=108%2C30%2C3825%2C2626&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Ukrainian refugees wait near the U.S. border in Tijuana, Mexico.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/APTOPIXUkraineRefugeesUnitedStates/807624ae5e484861b78de8d838d6d54f/photo?Query=refugees%20U.S.%20border&mediaType=photo&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=1004&currentItemNo=3">AP Photo/Gregory Bull</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the weeks since Russia invaded Ukraine, <a href="https://www.iom.int/news/71-million-people-displaced-war-ukraine-iom-survey">millions</a> of Ukrainians have fled the country as refugees. Hundreds of those refugees have now <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/more-russians-ukrainians-seek-asylum-us-mexico-border-2022-03-04/">arrived</a> at the southern border of the United States seeking asylum, after flying to Mexico on tourist visas.</p>
<p>At the border, Ukrainians, alongside thousands of other asylum seekers, must navigate two policies meant to keep people out. The first is the “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1353/lag.2021.0010">Migrant Protection Protocols</a>,” a U.S. government action initiated by the Trump administration in December 2018 and known informally as “Remain in Mexico.” The second is <a href="https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/guide-title-42-expulsions-border">Title 42</a>, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention directive crafted in 2020, ostensibly to protect public health during the COVID-19 pandemic. The directive expels all irregular immigrants (those without permanent residency or a visa in hand) and asylum seekers who try to enter the U.S. by land.</p>
<p>On March 11, 2022, however, the Biden administration provided <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1glEe8MnsNWR15BsfQtiaSR75yKBrCuqe/view">guidance</a> allowing Customs and Border Protection officers to <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ukraine-asylum-us-mexico-border/">exempt Ukrainians</a> from Title 42 on a case-by-case basis, which has allowed many families to enter. However, this exception has not been granted to other asylum seekers, no matter what danger they are in. It is possible that the administration may lift Title 42 at the end of May 2022, but that plan has encountered <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/26/politics/title-42-explainer-cec/index.html">fierce debates</a>.</p>
<p>The different treatment of Ukrainian versus Central American, African, Haitian and other asylum seekers has <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/29/us/ukrainians-us-mexico-border-cec/index.html">prompted</a> <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/african-immigrant-advocates-point-double-standard-ukrainians-receive-u-rcna23092">criticism</a> that the administration is enforcing immigration policies in racist ways, favoring white, European, mostly Christian refugees over other groups.</p>
<p>This issue is not new. As scholars of <a href="https://www.unomaha.edu/college-of-arts-and-sciences/religion/about-us/directory/laura-alexander.php">religion</a>, <a href="https://sis.tcu.edu/cres/faculty_staff/luis-romero/">race</a>, <a href="https://www.umary.edu/about/directory/karen-hooge-michalka-phd">immigration</a>, and <a href="https://www.oxy.edu/academics/faculty/jane-hong">racial and religious politics</a> in the United States, we study both historical and current immigration policy. We argue that U.S. refugee and asylum policy has long been racially and religiously discriminatory in practice.</p>
<h2>Chinese asylum seekers</h2>
<p>Race played a major role in who counted as a refugee during the early years of the Cold War. The displacement of millions fleeing communist regimes in <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/40068321">Eastern Europe</a> and <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/4499816">East Asia</a> created humanitarian crises in both places.</p>
<p>Under significant international pressure, Congress passed the 1953 Refugee Relief Act. According to historian <a href="https://www.albany.edu/history/faculty/carl-bon-tempo">Carl Bon Tempo</a>, in the minds of President Dwight Eisenhower and most lawmakers, “<a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691123325/americans-at-the-gate">refugee” meant “anticommunist European</a>.” The text and implementation of the act reflected this. Of the 214,000 visas set aside for refugees, the law designated a quota of only <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691176215/the-good-immigrants">5,000 spots for Asians</a> (2,000 for Chinese and 3,000 for “Far Eastern” refugees). Ultimately, approximately 9,000 Chinese (including 6,862 Chinese wives of U.S. citizens who came as nonquota migrants) were admitted under the 1953 refugee law, compared with nearly 200,000 southern and eastern Europeans, over the next three years. </p>
<p>Racial prejudice impacted the international response to refugees as well. By the late 1940s and early 1950s, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9248.1995.tb01712.x">United Nations officials</a> had declared the displaced population in Europe a humanitarian crisis and appealed to the international community to relieve these pressures by accepting refugees. Over the next decade, Western nations including the U.S., France and Great Britain received millions of displaced Europeans as part of a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/14682745.2020.1756781">larger Cold War public relations strategy</a> to contain the Soviet Union and demonstrate the <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/40068321">superiority of Western capitalist societies</a> to life behind the Iron Curtain. </p>
<p>Millions of ethnic Chinese displaced by the 1949 Communist Revolution <a href="https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501700149/the-diplomacy-of-migration/">were not greeted so kindly</a>. In the early 1950s, Hong Kong’s <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0026749X14000365">population tripled</a> due to mainland Chinese fleeing civil war and communist rule, triggering a crisis. Most Western countries, however, <a href="https://wwnorton.com/books/9780393634167">continued to exclude Chinese and other Asians from immigrating</a> and made few exceptions for refugees. </p>
<p>In the United States, exclusionary provisions that barred Asians from immigrating as “aliens ineligible to citizenship” would not be removed from immigration law until the <a href="https://uncpress.org/book/9781469653365/opening-the-gates-to-asia/">1965 Immigration Act</a>.</p>
<h2>Haitian asylum seekers</h2>
<p>The first Haitian asylum seekers, who are overwhelmingly Black, attempted to reach the U.S. in boats <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Immigration-Incorporation-and-Transnationalism/Barkan/p/book/9780765803863">in 1963</a> during the dictatorship of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0010417519000306">Francois Duvalier</a>. It was a period of great <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055421000289">economic inequality</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0010417519000306">severe violent repression</a> of political opposition in Haiti.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/460123/original/file-20220427-24-4xkqtt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Haitian men walking in a line wearing T-shirts and shorts, next to a ship, while a woman looks on." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/460123/original/file-20220427-24-4xkqtt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/460123/original/file-20220427-24-4xkqtt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/460123/original/file-20220427-24-4xkqtt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/460123/original/file-20220427-24-4xkqtt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/460123/original/file-20220427-24-4xkqtt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/460123/original/file-20220427-24-4xkqtt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/460123/original/file-20220427-24-4xkqtt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Haitian refugees who were intercepted by the U.S. Coast Guard returning to Port-au-Prince after being repatriated in 1992.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/HaitiRefugeesReturnHome1991/76ffd475da184cc6bb199d94e492741e/photo?Query=haitian%20refugees%20&mediaType=photo&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=645&currentItemNo=319">AP Photo/Daniel Morel</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.routledge.com/Immigration-Incorporation-and-Transnationalism/Barkan/p/book/9780765803863">Between 1973 and 1991</a>, more than 80,000 Haitians tried to seek asylum in the U.S. The U.S., however, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0002716294534001006">consistently attempted</a> to intercept and turn back boats carrying Haitian asylum seekers to avoid having to hear their cases.</p>
<p>In the 1980s and 1990s, nearly every single Haitian who tried to request asylum was either <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/1229010">denied or turned away</a>. Some disparities between asylum rates could be explained by political factors, particularly the U.S. government’s interest in <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24344212">prioritizing</a> refugees from communist countries.</p>
<p>However, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida and the 11th Circuit Court <a href="https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/503/442/1467096/">both</a> <a href="https://www.casemine.com/judgement/us/5914c3a8add7b049347c81bd">found</a>, in Haitian Refugee Center v. Civiletti and Jean v. Nelson respectively, that racial discrimination could be the only reason for such strikingly different outcomes for Haitians. In Jean v. Nelson, the 11th Circuit <a href="https://www.casemine.com/judgement/us/5914c3a8add7b049347c81bd">heard evidence from plaintiffs</a> that there was a less than two-in-1 billion chance that Haitians would be denied parole so consistently if immigration policies were applied in racially neutral ways. <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/1229010">Both courts also noted</a> the differences in outcomes of asylum claims between Cuban refugees, who were predominantly white, and Haitian refugees.</p>
<p>In the same time period, even while Black Haitian asylum seekers were being turned away, European immigrants, who were primarily white, received preference in the <a href="https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-104/pdf/STATUTE-104-Pg4978.pdf">Diversity Visa system</a> created by the Immigration Act of 1990. Northern Ireland, for example, was <a href="https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-104/pdf/STATUTE-104-Pg4978.pdf">designated</a> as a separate country from the United Kingdom, and 40% of “diversity transition” visas allocated during 1992 to 1994 were earmarked for Irish immigrants. </p>
<p>Similar <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/09/21/us-treatment-haitian-migrants-discriminatory">accusations</a> of racism and discriminatory treatment have surfaced over the last several months as Haitian asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border have been <a href="https://www.wola.org/analysis/a-tragic-milestone-20000th-migrant-deported-to-haiti-since-biden-inauguration/">forced onto flights</a> to Haiti and have faced <a href="https://www.npr.org/2021/09/21/1039230310/u-s-border-agents-haiti-migrants-horses-photographer-del-rio">degrading treatment</a>.</p>
<h2>Syrian refugees and the Muslim ban</h2>
<p>Beginning in January 2017, President Donald Trump issued <a href="https://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4616&context=wlulr">a series</a> of executive orders described by many refugee advocates as the “Muslim Ban.” The ban <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/27/us/politics/trump-syrian-refugees.html">suspended the entry of people from majority-Muslim countries</a>, including Syrians, and limited the number of refugee admissions of several majority-Muslim countries.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/460124/original/file-20220427-26-28awrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A large group of Syrian refugees waiting at Jordan's border." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/460124/original/file-20220427-26-28awrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/460124/original/file-20220427-26-28awrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/460124/original/file-20220427-26-28awrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/460124/original/file-20220427-26-28awrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/460124/original/file-20220427-26-28awrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/460124/original/file-20220427-26-28awrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/460124/original/file-20220427-26-28awrs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Few Syrian refugees were allowed into the U.S. In this photo, Syrian refugees wait to be approved to get into Jordan.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/CongressSyrianRefugees/f792f02ff60c45b8b605d01255eb5fc7/photo?Query=syrian%20refugees%20US%20border&mediaType=photo&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=366&currentItemNo=140">AP Photo/Raad Adayleh, File</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Syrian refugees, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/the-us-has-slashed-its-refugee-intake-syrians-fleeing-war-are-most-affected/2019/05/07/f764e57c-678f-11e9-a1b6-b29b90efa879_story.html">most of whom</a> fled the Syrian civil war that began in 2011 and violence by the Islamic State, were specifically targeted in the Muslim Ban. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2017/02/01/2017-02281/protecting-the-nation-from-foreign-terrorist-entry-into-the-united-states">A February 2017 version</a> of the Muslim Ban claimed that Syrian refugees were “detrimental to the interests of the United States and thus suspend[ed]” from admission, with few exceptions. This contributed to a <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/742553/syrian-refugee-arrivals-us/#:%7E:text=In%20the%20fiscal%20year%20of,Syrian%20refugees%20admitted%2C%20at%2012%2C587">significant decrease in the number of Syrian refugees</a> – from 12,587 to 76 between financial year 2016 to 2018.</p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0896920513516022">Research shows</a> that <a href="https://nyupress.org/9781479838073/islamophobia-and-racism-in-america/">religion, particularly Islam</a>, is used to create <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/000312240807300103">symbolic boundaries</a> of racial distinction in order to promote <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2017.1349919">immigration enforcement goals</a>. Specifically, the government attempted to justify an exclusionary refugee policy based on race and religion by implicating Muslims and refugees in terrorism, as Trump did in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/dec/07/donald-trump-ban-all-muslims-entering-us-san-bernardino-shooting">speeches</a>, even calling Syrians the “<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2015/11/16/politics/donald-trump-syrian-refugees/index.html">trojan horse</a>” for terrorism. </p>
<p>International agreements for refugees and asylum seekers <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/en-us/3b66c2aa10">clearly state</a> that admissions should be based on need. In principle, <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1158">U.S. law</a> says this as well. But these key moments in United States history show how race, religion and other factors play a role in determining who is in, and who is out. </p>
<p>While refugees from the war in Ukraine deserve support from the United States and other countries, the contrast between the treatment of different groups of refugees shows that the process of gaining refuge in the United States is still far from equitable.</p>
<p>[<em>Explore the intersection of faith, politics, arts and culture.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/this-week-in-religion-76/?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=religion-explore">Sign up for This Week in Religion.</a>]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/181700/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Laura E. Alexander receives funding from the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) as a Public Fellow.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jane Hong receives funding from Public Religion Research Institute as a public fellow and from the Louisville Institute as the recipient of a sabbatical grant.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Karen Hooge Michalka receives funding from the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) as a Public Fellow and is a board member with Bismarck Global Neighbors.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Luis A. Romero receives funding from the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) as a Public Fellow. </span></em></p>Four scholars of race, religion and immigration explain how US refugee and asylum policy has long been racially and religiously discriminatory in practice.Laura E. Alexander, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, Goldstein Family Community Chair in Human Rights, University of Nebraska OmahaJane Hong, Associate Professor of History, Occidental CollegeKaren Hooge Michalka, Assistant Professor of Sociology, University of MaryLuis A. Romero, Assistant Professor, Texas Christian UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1816622022-04-25T12:12:24Z2022-04-25T12:12:24ZThe Cleveland Indians changed their team name – what’s holding back the Atlanta Braves?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/459145/original/file-20220421-24-ondbdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=17%2C8%2C2977%2C1854&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Atlanta Braves fans perform the 'tomahawk chop' during a playoff game in 2004.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/fans-of-the-atlanta-braves-do-the-tomahawk-chop-during-news-photo/51433584?adppopup=true"> Streeter Lecka/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In October 1995, as the Cleveland Indians and Atlanta Braves prepared to <a href="https://www.baseball-reference.com/postseason/1995_WS.shtml">face off in the World Series</a>, a group of Native Americans rallied outside Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium to protest what they called both teams’ racist names and mascots. Some protesters carried signs, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/sports/1995/10/22/protesters-single-out-nicknames/5ca89d46-0ecb-46b3-a979-fbe6fa497af6/">including one that said</a>, “Human beings as mascots is not politically incorrect. It is morally wrong.”</p>
<p>They marched outside the ballpark, where some vendors were selling the foam tomahawks that Braves fans wave during the “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGuChxSvuh8">tomahawk chop</a>” – a cheer in which they mimic a Native American war chant while making a hammering motion with their arms. </p>
<p>It wasn’t until 2018 that the Indians <a href="https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/22255143/cleveland-indians-removing-chief-wahoo-logo-uniforms">officially removed their logo</a>, a cartoonish Native American named Chief Wahoo, from their merchandise, banners and ballpark. In 2020 the owners agreed to change the Indians name itself. For the 2022 season, <a href="https://www.nbc15.com/2021/07/23/meet-guardians-cleveland-indians-announce-new-nickname/">they would begin using the new name</a>, the Guardians.</p>
<p>The Atlanta Braves’ owners, however, have dug in their heels, refusing to replace a name that many Americans – including Native Americans – find offensive and derogatory.</p>
<p>In July 2020 – in the midst of the nationwide protests around racism, sparked by the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police – <a href="https://wamu.org/story/20/07/11/the-racial-justice-reckoning-over-sports-team-names-is-spreading/">some Atlanta fans again urged the team to change its name</a>. In response, the Braves’ brass <a href="https://twitter.com/uniwatch/status/1282360397195075585?lang=en">sent a letter</a> to season ticket holders, insisting, “We will always be the Atlanta Braves.”</p>
<p>The insistence on preserving the team name – along with fan traditions like the tomahawk chop – is even more glaring given the city’s links to the civil rights movement.</p>
<h2>The road to Atlanta</h2>
<p>For many years, NFL football team owner Dan Snyder refused to change the name of his Washington Redskins – perhaps one of the more egregiously racist team names in any sport. But in 2020 <a href="https://www.nbcsports.com/washington/football-team/timeline-washington-football-teams-name-change-saga">he finally relented</a>, yielding to pressure from investors and corporate sponsors. The team played as the Washington Football Team for two seasons <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/02/06/1078571919/washington-commanders-name-change-native-americans">before becoming the Commanders</a> this year.</p>
<p>However, when professional sports teams do change their names, <a href="https://www.nbcsports.com/washington/football-team/pro-sports-teams-changed-their-name-without-changing-cities">it’s usually done for marketing reasons</a> rather than social ones. </p>
<p>The NFL’s Tennessee Oilers rebranded themselves the Tennessee Titans in 1999, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays became the Tampa Bay Rays in 2008 and the New Orleans Hornets turned into the Pelicans in 2013.</p>
<p>The Braves have had their own merry-go-round with team names.</p>
<p>The story begins in 1876, when Boston’s professional baseball team was known as the Red Stockings. In 1883, they became the Beaneaters and kept that name until 1907, when new owner <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1909/06/20/archives/baseball-president-dead-george-dovey-of-boston-passes-away-on-a.html">George Dovey</a> changed it to the Doves, a tribute to himself. In 1911, William Russell bought the team and renamed it <a href="https://www.baseball-almanac.com/mgrtmab7.shtml">the Rustlers</a>, also after himself. But a year later, James Gaffney, a New York City alderman, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1993/06/26/opinion/l-what-atlanta-braves-share-with-boss-tweed-980393.html">purchased the team</a>. </p>
<p>Gaffney was part of Tammany Hall, a New York City political club named after <a href="https://www.ustwp.org/government/boards-commissions/historical-advisory-board/chief-tamanend/">Tamanend</a>, a Delaware Indian chief. Tammany Hall used a Native American wearing a headdress <a href="https://bkskarch.com/2020/11/17/go-inside-the-new-glass-dome-atop-union-squares-tammany-hall/">as its emblem</a> and <a href="https://www.mlb.com/news/atlanta-braves-team-name-origin">referred to its members</a> as “braves.” So Gaffney gave his team a new moniker. From thenceforth they would be known as the Boston Braves. </p>
<p>In 1935, <a href="https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/bob-quinn/">Bob Quinn</a> purchased the Braves after a season in which they sported the worst record in baseball: <a href="https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/BSN/1935.shtml">38 wins and 115 losses</a>. Hoping to give the team a fresh start, he renamed it the <a href="https://massachusettsbaseballhistory.com/2021/04/08/bostons-original-blue-and-yellow-team/">Boston Bees</a>, but the team continued to perform poorly. In 1940, construction magnate <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1972/04/17/archives/lou-perini-owner-who-took-braves-to-milwaukee-is-dead.html">Lou Perini</a> bought the team and changed the name back to the Braves. </p>
<p>In 1953, Perini moved the Braves to Milwaukee – the first team relocation since 1903. Nine years later, he sold the Braves to some Chicago investors led by <a href="https://www.ajc.com/sports/baseball/former-braves-owner-bill-bartholomay-who-moved-team-atlanta-dies/B43tnVnOAgQbjNhi3ptEGN/">William Bartholomay</a>, who quickly began looking to move the team to a larger television market. </p>
<h2>A commitment to improving race relations</h2>
<p>Atlanta Mayor <a href="https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/government-politics/ivan-allen-jr-1911-2003/">Ivan Allen Jr.</a> courted Bartholomay. To lure the team, he persuaded Fulton County to build Atlanta–Fulton County Stadium <a href="https://www.todayingeorgiahistory.org/tih-georgia-day/atlanta-fulton-county-stadium">for US$18 million</a> – equal to $161 million today.</p>
<p>But Hank Aaron, the Braves’ biggest star, was reluctant to move to Atlanta. </p>
<p>Although it promoted itself as an enlightened place – the city had recently rebranded itself as “<a href="https://www.nps.gov/features/malu/feat0002/wof/ivan_allen.htm">The City Too Busy to Hate</a>” – Atlanta <a href="https://www.facingsouth.org/2015/05/the-most-racially-segregated-cities-in-the-south.html">was still highly segregated</a>. It was the capital of a state represented by segregationist politicians such as long-serving Sens. <a href="https://faculty1.coloradocollege.edu/%7Ebloevy/toEndAllSegregation/ToEndAllSegregation-008.pdf">Richard Russell</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/22/us/herman-talmadge-georgia-senator-and-governor-dies-at-88.html">Herman Talmadge</a>. Aaron, a native of Mobile, Alabama, had no interest in returning to the Deep South racism of his birthplace. </p>
<p>The NAACP and Urban League asked Aaron to give the South a second chance. <a href="https://www.espn.com/espn/commentary/news/story?id=6015125">Aaron met with Martin Luther King Jr.</a>, who convinced him that bringing the Braves to Atlanta would help the civil rights cause.</p>
<p>Before he would agree to join the Braves in Atlanta, however, Aaron insisted that Fulton County Stadium seating and facilities be desegregated. Mayor Allen shared that view. <a href="https://www.espn.com/espn/commentary/news/story?id=6015125">The city and the Braves complied</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Man wearing blue baseball jersey sits in a dugout bench." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/459137/original/file-20220421-12-x61miq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/459137/original/file-20220421-12-x61miq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/459137/original/file-20220421-12-x61miq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/459137/original/file-20220421-12-x61miq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/459137/original/file-20220421-12-x61miq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/459137/original/file-20220421-12-x61miq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/459137/original/file-20220421-12-x61miq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Slugger Hank Aaron went along with the team to Atlanta only after some lobbying from Martin Luther King Jr.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/outfielder-hank-aaron-of-the-atlanta-braves-relaxes-in-the-news-photo/51455615?adppopup=true">Focus on Sport via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Jimmy Carter, who served as Georgia’s governor from 1971 to 1975 before being elected president, <a href="https://www.espn.com/espn/commentary/news/story?id=6015125">recalled that</a> having a major league team in Atlanta “gave us the opportunity to be known for something that wasn’t going to be a national embarrassment.” Carter said that Aaron “was the first Black man that white fans in the South cheered for.” </p>
<h2>The chief and the chop</h2>
<p>As the Braves worked to mend relations with the city’s Black community, they didn’t seem to consider how their marketing efforts might offend Native Americans. </p>
<p>In 1966, the year the Braves moved to Atlanta, the team adopted a mascot, <a href="https://www.ajc.com/sports/baseball/whatever-happened-chief-noc-homa-levi-walker/ZoBlkrVjEyQbfa85BZbs8H/">Chief Noc-A-Homa</a>, who danced around a teepee behind the left field fence dressed in Native American garb and occasionally performed on the field.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Man in Native American garb spreads his arms." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/459134/original/file-20220421-25-phqaml.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/459134/original/file-20220421-25-phqaml.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/459134/original/file-20220421-25-phqaml.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/459134/original/file-20220421-25-phqaml.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/459134/original/file-20220421-25-phqaml.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/459134/original/file-20220421-25-phqaml.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/459134/original/file-20220421-25-phqaml.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Atlanta Braves retired mascot Chief Noc-a-Homa in 1985.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/this-1983-file-photo-of-chief-noc-a-homa-the-atlanta-braves-news-photo/838580900?adppopup=true">Denver Post via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>Under public pressure, <a href="https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1986/01/19/571286.html?pageNumber=352">the team abandoned</a> Chief Noc-A-Homa in 1985. But a few years later, Braves organist Carolyn King started playing the “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQOs0m3wTBY">tomahawk song</a>”
before Braves batters stepped up to the plate. By 1991, the fans had fully adopted the chop.</p>
<p>Today, many fans – not to mention many Native Americans – cringe at the music and the chop. To them, it reflects a stereotypical image of Native Americans as violent and uncivilized, <a href="https://deadline.com/2020/10/native-american-writers-urge-industry-to-make-amends-for-stereotypical-portrayals-inadequate-representation-1234595944/">similar to those</a> that appeared <a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442229624/Native-Americans-on-Network-TV-Stereotypes-Myths-and-the-">on TV</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/481668">in movies</a> for many years. </p>
<p>In 2019, Ryan Helsley, a pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals and a member of the Cherokee Nation, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2019/10/05/cardinals-pitcher-calls-braves-tomahawk-chop-disappointing-disrespectful/">took issue with the tomahawk chop</a> after pitching against the Braves.</p>
<p>“I think it’s a misrepresentation of the Cherokee people or Native Americans in general. Just depicts them in this kind of caveman-type people way who aren’t intellectual,” Helsley told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.</p>
<p>“They are a lot more than that,” he said. “It devalues us and how we’re perceived in that way, or used as mascots.” </p>
<h2>A name that honors the region’s history</h2>
<p>The Braves are now owned by Liberty Media Corp., a $17 billion conglomerate controlled by Chair John C. Malone, <a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/john-malone/?sh=529309001505">who is personally worth $7.5 billion</a>. Only pressure from the Braves’ corporate sponsors, fans, other teams, and even some players will likely push Malone to make a change. </p>
<p>After Aaron died last year, <a href="https://www.11alive.com/article/sports/mlb/atlanta-braves/atlanta-braves-name-change-hammers-hank-aaron/85-bc8ad39e-0199-4729-a024-0ea180929896">some Braves fans urged the owners</a> to change the name to the “Hammers” to honor the slugger who was nicknamed “Hammerin’ Hank” or just “The Hammer.” His boosters pointed out that it would be simple to put a hammer in place of the tomahawk, which now adorns all Braves uniforms and the team logo. Some version of the cheer could even remain, but with hammers, not tomahawks. </p>
<p>But I’d like to suggest a team name that would make an even bigger statement: the Atlanta Kings, in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. King grew up in Atlanta, attended Morehouse College, and spent most of his adult life there. His childhood home, the church he served as minister and the King Center, an educational nonprofit, are all located in Atlanta.</p>
<p>[<em>Over 150,000 readers rely on The Conversation’s newsletters to understand the world.</em> <a href="https://memberservices.theconversation.com/newsletters/?source=inline-150ksignup">Sign up today</a>.]</p>
<p>King understood the importance of baseball in American culture. He befriended and <a href="https://theconversation.com/jackie-robinson-was-a-radical-dont-listen-to-the-sanitized-version-of-history-179732">worked closely with Jackie Robinson during the civil rights movement</a>. And he helped bring the team to Atlanta.</p>
<p>I think it would be fitting for the Braves to become the Kings and replace the tomahawk with a crown. Or, in the spirit of inclusion, the team could be rechristened as the Atlanta Hammer Kings. And the team could adopt Pete Seeger’s easy-to-sing “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO39e5Uznu4">If I Had a Hammer</a>” as its theme song.</p>
<p>All it would take is some political courage.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/181662/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Dreier does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The insistence on preserving the team name – along with fan traditions like the ‘tomahawk chop’ – is even more glaring given the city’s links to the civil rights movement.Peter Dreier, E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of Politics, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1797322022-04-14T12:15:48Z2022-04-14T12:15:48ZJackie Robinson was a radical – don’t listen to the sanitized version of history<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457776/original/file-20220412-17-7a6boo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=74%2C31%2C1838%2C1500&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Jackie Robinson addresses civil rights supporters protesting outside the 1964 GOP National Convention.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/baseball-star-jackie-robinson-addresses-civil-rights-news-photo/576842774?adppopup=true">Ted Streshinsky/Corbis via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In our new book, “<a href="https://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/nebraska/9781496217776/">Baseball Rebels: The Players, People, and Social Movements That Shook Up the Game and Changed America</a>,” Rob Elias and I profile the many iconoclasts, dissenters and mavericks who defied baseball’s and society’s establishment. </p>
<p>But none took as many risks – and had as big an impact – as Jackie Robinson. Though Robinson was a fierce competitor, an outstanding athlete and a deeply <a href="https://sabr.org/journal/article/jackie-robinsons-faith-sustained-him-during-unrelenting-turmoil/">religious man</a>, the aspect of his legacy that often gets glossed over is that he was also a radical.</p>
<p>The sanitized version of the Jackie Robinson story goes something like this: He was a remarkable athlete who, <a href="https://sourcesofinsight.com/jackie-robinson-story-of-self-control/">with his unusual level of self-control</a>, was the perfect person to break baseball’s color line. In the face of jeers and taunts, he was able to put his head down and let his play do the talking, becoming a symbol of the promise of a racially integrated society.</p>
<p>On April 15 in 2022, marking the 75th anniversary of Jackie Robinson’s breaking baseball’s color line, Major League Baseball celebrated the occasion with great fanfare – with <a href="https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=723832598808868">tributes</a>, movies, <a href="https://www.espnfrontrow.com/2022/03/jackie-to-me-go-inside-espns-10-part-video-series-honoring-jackie-robinsons-legacy/">TV specials</a>, <a href="https://nmaahc.si.edu/events/75th-anniversary-and-celebration-jackie-robinson-day">museum exhibits</a> and <a href="https://www.mlb.com/news/jackie-robinson-75th-anniversary-symposium">symposia</a>. </p>
<p>I wonder, however, about the extent to which these celebrations will downplay his activism during and after his playing career. Will they delve into the forces arrayed against Robinson – the players, fans, reporters, politicians and baseball executives who scorned his outspoken views on race? Will any Jackie Robinson Day events mention that, toward the end of his life, he wrote that he had become so disillusioned with the country’s racial progress that he couldn’t stand for the flag and sing the national anthem?</p>
<h2>Laying the groundwork</h2>
<p>Robinson was a rebel before he broke baseball’s color line. </p>
<p>When he was a soldier during World War II, his superiors sought to keep him out of officer candidate school. He persevered and became a second lieutenant. But in 1944, while assigned to a training camp at Fort Hood in Texas, <a href="https://www.americanheritage.com/court-martial-jackie-robinson">he refused to move to the back of an army bus</a> when the white driver ordered him to do so. </p>
<p>Robinson faced trumped-up charges of insubordination, disturbing the peace, drunkenness, conduct unbecoming an officer and refusing to obey the orders of a superior officer. Voting by secret ballot, the nine military judges – only one of them Black – found Robinson not guilty. In November, he was honorably discharged from the Army.</p>
<p>Describing the ordeal, Robinson later wrote, “It was a small victory, for I had learned that I was in two wars, one against the foreign enemy, the other against prejudice at home.”</p>
<p>Three years later, Robinson would suit up for the Dodgers. </p>
<p>His arrival didn’t occur in a vacuum. It marked the culmination of <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-politics-played-a-major-role-in-the-signing-of-jackie-robinson-56890">more than a decade of protests</a> to desegregate the national pastime. It was a political victory brought about by a persistent and progressive movement that confronted powerful business interests that were reluctant – even opposed – to bring about change. </p>
<p>Beginning in the 1930s, the movement mobilized a broad coalition of organizations – the Black press, civil rights groups, the Communist Party, progressive white activists, left-wing unions and radical politicians – that waged a <a href="https://sabr.org/journal/article/before-jackie-robinson-baseballs-civil-rights-movement/">sustained campaign</a> to integrate baseball. </p>
<h2>Biting his tongue, biding his time</h2>
<p>This protest movement set the stage for Brooklyn Dodgers executive Branch Rickey to sign Robinson to a contract in 1945. Robinson spent the 1946 season with the Montreal Royals, the Dodgers’ top farm club, where he led the team to the minor league championship. The following season, he was brought up to the big leagues.</p>
<p>Robinson <a href="https://sabr.org/journal/article/jackie-robinsons-faith-sustained-him-during-unrelenting-turmoil/">promised Rickey</a> that – at least during his rookie year – he wouldn’t respond to the verbal barbs from fans, managers and other players he would face on a daily basis. </p>
<p>His first test took place a week after he joined the Dodgers, during a game against the Philadelphia Phillies. Phillies manager <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/15/sports/baseball/philadelphia-apologizes-to-jackie-robinson.html">Ben Chapman</a> called Robinson the n-word and shouted, “Go back to the cotton field where you belong.” </p>
<p>Though Robinson seethed with anger, he kept his promise to Rickey, enduring the abuse without retaliating. </p>
<p>But after that first year, he increasingly spoke out against racial injustice in speeches, interviews and his regular newspaper columns for The Pittsburgh Courier, New York Post and the New York Amsterdam News.</p>
<p>Many sportswriters and most other players – including some of his fellow Black players – balked at the way Robinson talked about race. They thought he was too angry, too vocal.</p>
<p>Syndicated sports columnist Dick Young of the New York Daily News griped that when he talked to Robinson’s Black teammate Roy Campanella, they stuck to baseball. But when he spoke with Robinson, “sooner or later we get around to social issues.” </p>
<p>A 1953 article in Sport magazine titled “Why They Boo Jackie Robinson” described the second baseman as “combative,” “emotional” and “calculating,” as well as a “pop-off,” a “whiner,” a “showboat” and a “troublemaker.” A Cleveland paper called Robinson a “rabble rouser” who was on a “soap box.” The Sporting News headlined one story “Robinson Should Be a Player, Not a Crusader.” Other writers and players called him a “loudmouth,” a “sorehead” and worse.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, Robinson’s relentless advocacy got the attention of the country’s civil rights leaders.</p>
<p>In 1956, the NAACP gave him its highest honor, <a href="https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/naacp-spingarn-medal-1914/">the Spingarn Medal</a>. He was the first athlete to receive that award. In his acceptance speech, he explained that although many people had warned him “not to speak up every time I thought there was an injustice,” he would continue to do so.</p>
<h2>‘A freedom rider before the Freedom Rides’</h2>
<p>After Robinson hung up his cleats in 1957, he stayed true to his word, becoming a constant presence on picket lines and at civil rights rallies.</p>
<p>That same year, he publicly urged President Dwight Eisenhower to send troops to Little Rock, Arkansas, to protect Black students seeking to desegregate its public schools. In 1960, impressed with the resilience and courage of the college students engaging in sit-ins at Southern lunch counters, <a href="https://andscape.com/features/how-jackie-robinsons-love-of-jazz-helped-civil-rights-movement/">he agreed to raise bail money</a> for the students stuck in jail cells.</p>
<p>Robinson initially supported the 1960 presidential campaign of Sen. Hubert Humphrey, a Minnesota Democrat and staunch ally of the civil rights movement. But when John F. Kennedy won the party’s nomination, Robinson – worried that JFK would be beholden to <a href="https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/generic/CivilRightsAct1964.htm">Southern Democrats who opposed integration</a> – endorsed Republican Richard Nixon. He quickly regretted that decision after Nixon refused to campaign in Harlem or speak out against the arrest of Martin Luther King Jr. in rural Georgia. Three weeks before Election Day, <a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781538110201/Jackie-Robinson-An-Integrated-Life">Robinson said that</a> “Nixon doesn’t deserve to win.” </p>
<p>In February 1962, Robinson traveled to Jackson, Mississippi, to speak at a rally organized by NAACP leader Medgar Evers. Later that year, at King’s request, Robinson traveled to Albany, Georgia, to draw media attention to three Black churches that had been burned to the ground by segregationists. He then led a fundraising campaign <a href="https://georgiahistoryfestival.org/a-legacy-of-leadership-jackie-robinsons-leadership-on-and-off-the-field/">that collected $50,000</a> to rebuild the churches.</p>
<p>In 1963 he devoted considerable time and travel to support King’s voter registration efforts in the South. He also traveled to Birmingham, Alabama, as part of King’s campaign to dismantle segregation in that city. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Group of men in suits gathered around a lectern." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457701/original/file-20220412-37987-ydxqjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/457701/original/file-20220412-37987-ydxqjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457701/original/file-20220412-37987-ydxqjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457701/original/file-20220412-37987-ydxqjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457701/original/file-20220412-37987-ydxqjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457701/original/file-20220412-37987-ydxqjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/457701/original/file-20220412-37987-ydxqjq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jackie Robinson, to the right of Martin Luther King Jr., appeared at a rally in Birmingham, Alabama, in May 1963.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/two-of-the-sporting-worlds-greats-visited-birmingham-to-news-photo/517384458?adppopup=true">Bettmann/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>“His presence in the South was very important to us,” <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/137494/jackie-robinson-by-arnold-rampersad/">recalled Wyatt Tee Walker</a>, chief of staff of King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference. <a href="https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/robinson-jackie">King called Robinson</a> “a sit-inner before the sit-ins, a freedom rider before the Freedom Rides.” </p>
<p>Robinson also consistently criticized police brutality. In August 1968, three Black Panthers in New York City were arrested and charged with assaulting a white police officer. At their hearing two weeks later, about 150 white men, including off-duty police officers, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1968/09/05/archives/offduty-police-here-join-in-beating-black-panthers-among-150.html">stormed the courthouse and attacked</a> 10 Panthers and two white supporters. When he learned that the police had made no arrests of the white rioters, Robinson was outraged.</p>
<p>“The Black Panthers seek self-determination, protection of the Black community, decent housing and employment and express opposition to police abuse,” <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/Jackie_Robinson_in_Quotes.html?id=Ob2pCgAAQBAJ">Robinson said</a> during a press conference at the Black Panthers’ headquarters.</p>
<p>He challenged banks for discriminating against Black neighborhoods and condemned slumlords who preyed on Black families.</p>
<p>And Robinson wasn’t done holding Major League Baseball to account, either. He refused to participate in a 1969 Old Timers game because he didn’t see “genuine interest in breaking the barriers that deny access to managerial and front office positions.” At his final public appearance, throwing the ceremonial first pitch before Game 2 of the 1972 World Series, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/24/sports/baseball/24vecsey.html">Robinson observed</a>, “I’m going to be tremendously more pleased and more proud when I look at that third base coaching line one day and see a black face managing in baseball.”</p>
<p>No major league team had a Black manager until Frank Robinson <a href="https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/25946566/frank-robinson-mvp-first-black-manager-dies-83">was hired by the Cleveland Indians in 1975</a>, three years after Jackie Robinson’s death. The absence of Black managers and front-office executives is an issue that <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/video/dusty-baker-lack-of-african-american-mlb-managers-is-very-dangerous-trend-184238335.html">MLB still grapples with today</a>.</p>
<h2>Athlete activism, then and now</h2>
<p>Athletes still face backlash for speaking out. When NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick protested racism by refusing to stand during the national anthem, then-President <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/made-by-history/wp/2018/05/25/donald-trump-said-protesting-nfl-players-shouldnt-be-in-this-country-we-should-take-him-seriously/">Donald Trump said</a> that athletes who followed Kaepernick’s example “shouldn’t be in the country.” </p>
<p>In 2018, after NBA star LeBron James spoke about a racial slur that had been graffitied on his home and criticized Trump, Fox News’ Laura Ingraham suggested that he “<a href="https://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/sports/lebron-james-responds-to-laura-ingrahams-shut-up-and-dribble-with-powerful-post-about-police-brutality/2375333/">shut up and dribble</a>.”</p>
<p>Even so, in the past decade, athletes have become more outspoken on issues of racism, homophobia, sexism, American militarism, immigrant rights and other issues. They all stand on Robinson’s shoulders.</p>
<p>It was Robinson’s strong patriotism that led him to challenge America to live up to its ideals. He felt an obligation to use his fame to challenge the society’s racial injustice. However, during his last few years – before he died of a heart attack in 1972 at age 53 – he grew increasingly disillusioned with the pace of racial progress. </p>
<p>In his 1972 memoir, “I Never Had It Made,” he wrote: “I cannot stand and sing the anthem. I cannot salute the flag; I know that I am a Black man in a white world.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/179732/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Dreier does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Years before Colin Kaepernick was born, Robinson wrote, ‘I cannot stand and sing the anthem. I cannot salute the flag; I know that I am a Black man in a white world.’Peter Dreier, E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of Politics, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1759832022-02-03T13:10:24Z2022-02-03T13:10:24ZLos Angeles’ long, troubled history with urban oil drilling is nearing an end after years of health concerns<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/443965/original/file-20220202-13-lvg7ez.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C58%2C2860%2C1877&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Oil pumps can be found near homes across the Los Angeles area.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-oil-well-pumps-in-a-newly-constructed-neighborhood-near-news-photo/2043026">David McNew/Getty Image</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Los Angeles had oil wells pumping in its neighborhoods when Hollywood was in its infancy, and thousands of active wells still dot the city.</p>
<p>These wells can emit toxic chemicals such as benzene and other irritants into the air, often just feet from homes, schools and parks. But now, after nearly a decade of community organizing and studies demonstrating the adverse health impacts on people living nearby, Los Angeles’ long history with urban drilling is nearing an end.</p>
<p>In a <a href="https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-01-26/l-a-city-council-moves-to-phase-out-oil-and-gas-drilling">unanimous vote</a> on Jan. 26, 2022, the Los Angeles City Council took the first step toward phasing out all oil and gas extraction in the city by declaring oil extraction a nonconforming land use. That came on the heels of a unanimous vote by <a href="https://mitchell.lacounty.gov/board-of-supervisors-passes-landmark-motions-to-phase-out-oil-drilling/">Los Angeles County supervisors</a> to phase out oil extraction in unincorporated county areas. </p>
<p>As <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=t4m6sjAAAAAJ&hl=en">environmental health</a> <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Bhavna-Shamasunder">researchers</a>, we study the impacts of oil drilling on surrounding communities. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">Our research</a> shows that <a href="http://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15010138">people living near these urban oil operations</a> suffer higher rates of asthma than average, as well as wheezing, eye irritation and sore throats. In some cases, the impact on residents’ lungs is worse than living beside a highway or being exposed to secondhand smoke every day. </p>
<h2>LA was once an oil town with forests of derricks</h2>
<p>Over a century ago, the <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3985379">first industry to boom</a> in Los Angeles was oil. </p>
<p>Oil was abundant and flowed close to the surface. In early 20th-century California, sparse laws governed mineral extraction, and rights to oil accrued to those who could pull it out of the ground first. This ushered in a period of rampant drilling, with wells and associated machinery crisscrossing the landscape. By the mid-1920s, Los Angeles was one of the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3985379?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents">largest oil-exporting regions</a> in the world. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A historic black-and-white photo shows a street with houses, old cars and dozens of oil derricks on the hill behind them." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A 1924 photo shows the oil derricks on Signal Hill.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_City_Views%20(1925%20+).html">Water and Power Museum Archive</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An old black-and-white photo of a roller coaster on a pier, with the city behind it and then a long row of oil derricks behind that on a ridge." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The view across The Pike amusement park and downtown Long Beach, California, in 1940 shows a forest of oil derricks in the background.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_City_Views%20(1925%20+).html">Water and Power Museum Archive</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Oil rigs were so pervasive across the region that the Los Angeles Times described them in 1930 as “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jas079">trees in a forest</a>.” Working-class communities were initially supportive of the industry because it promised jobs but later <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3985379">pushed back</a> as their neighborhoods witnessed explosions and oil spills, along with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-004-1159-0">longer-term damage to land, water and human health</a>.</p>
<p>Tensions over land use, extraction rights and subsequent drops in oil prices due to overproduction eventually resulted in curbs on drilling and a long-standing practice of oil companies’ voluntary “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jas079">self-regulation</a>,” such as noise-reduction technologies. The industry began touting these voluntary approaches to deflect governmental regulation.</p>
<p>Increasingly, oil companies disguised their activities with approaches such as operating <a href="https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/hidden-oil-wells/">inside buildings, building tall walls</a> and <a href="https://lbbusinessjournal.com/thums-oil-islands-half-a-century-later-still-unique-still-iconic">designing islands off Long Beach</a> and other sites to blend in with the landscape. Oil drilling was hidden in plain sight. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A silhouetted student with a backpack walks past an oil derrick covered with drawings of flowers outside a school." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Beverly Hills High School earned money from an oil well, hidden behind walls covered with flower drawings, that operated until 2017 but raised health concerns.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/decorative-flowery-exterior-masks-an-oil-rig-along-olympic-news-photo/566019401">Luis Sinco/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Today there are over 20,000 active, idle or abandoned wells spread across a county of 10 million people. About <a href="https://news.usc.edu/184929/urban-oil-wells-drilling-lung-health-los-angeles-usc-research/">one-third of residents</a> live less than a mile from an active well site, <a href="https://maps.conservation.ca.gov/doggr/wellfinder/#openModal/-118.23225/33.87983/12">some right next door</a>.</p>
<p>Since the 2000s, the advance of extractive technologies to access harder-to-reach deposits has led to a resurgence of oil extraction activities. As extraction in some neighborhoods has ramped up, people living in South Los Angeles and other neighborhoods in oil fields have noticed frequent <a href="https://www.latimes.com/local/la-xpm-2013-sep-21-la-me-0922-oil-20130922-story.html">odors, nosebleeds and headaches</a>. </p>
<h2>Closer to urban oil drilling, poorer lung function</h2>
<p>The city of Los Angeles has no buffers or setbacks between oil extraction and homes, and approximately <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">75% of active oil or gas wells are located within 500 meters</a> (1,640 feet) of “sensitive land uses,” such as homes, schools, child care facilities, parks or senior residential facilities. </p>
<p>Despite over a century of oil drilling in Los Angeles, until recently there was limited research into the health impacts. Working with <a href="https://envhealthcenters.usc.edu/2021/04/harnessing-the-expertise-of-community-health-workers-for-environmental-health-research.html">community health workers</a> and community-based organizations helped us gauge the impact oil wells are having on residents, particularly on its historically Black and Hispanic neighborhoods.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cSfXx7cMNWc?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Oil drilling in Los Angeles.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The first step was a door-to-door survey of 813 neighbors from 203 households near wells in Las Cienegas oil field, just south and west of downtown. We found that <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15010138">asthma</a> was significantly more common among people living near South Los Angeles oil wells than among residents of <a href="https://ask.chis.ucla.edu">Los Angeles County as a whole</a>. Nearly half the people we spoke with, 45%, didn’t know oil wells were operating nearby, and 63% didn’t know how to contact local regulatory authorities to report odors or environmental hazards. </p>
<p>Next, we measured lung function of 747 long-term residents, ages 10 to 85, living near two drilling sites. Poor lung capacity, measured as the amount of air a person can exhale after taking a deep breath, and lung strength, how strongly the person can exhale, and are both predictors of health problems including <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10654-012-9750-2">respiratory disease, death from cardiovascular problems</a> and <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/thorax.58.5.388">early death in general</a>.</p>
<p>We found that the closer someone lived to an active or recently idle well site, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">the poorer that person’s lung function</a>, even after adjusting for such other risk factors as smoking, asthma and living near a freeway. This research demonstrates a significant relationship between living near oil wells and worsened lung health.</p>
<p>People living up to 1,000 meters (0.6 miles) downwind of a well site showed lower lung function on average than those living farther away and upwind. The effect on their lungs’ capacity and strength was similar to impacts of living near a freeway or, for women, being exposed to secondhand smoke.</p>
<p><iframe id="g7Qgh" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/g7Qgh/5/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Using a community monitoring network in South Los Angeles, we were able to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2020.117519">distinguish oil-related pollution</a> in neighborhoods near wells. We found short-term spikes of air pollutants and methane, a potent greenhouse gas, at monitors <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.146194">less than 500 meters, about one-third of a mile, from oil sites</a>.</p>
<p>When oil production at a site <a href="https://doi.org/10.1039/D1EM00048A">stopped</a>, we observed significant reductions in such toxins as benzene, toluene and n-hexane in the air in adjacent neighborhoods. These <a href="https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/ToxProfiles/tp123-p.pdf">chemicals</a> are known irritants, carcinogens and reproductive toxins. They are also associated with dizziness, headaches, fatigue, tremors and respiratory system irritation, including difficulty breathing and, at higher levels, impaired lung function. </p>
<h2>Vulnerable communities at risk</h2>
<p>Many of the dozens of active oil wells in South Los Angeles are in historically Black and Hispanic communities that have been marginalized for decades. These neighborhoods are already considered among the <a href="https://oehha.ca.gov/calenviroscreen/report/calenviroscreen-30">most highly polluted, with the most vulnerable residents</a> in the state.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Map showing active well sites." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A state app called Well Finder locates active oil wells, including in Los Angeles County.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://maps.conservation.ca.gov/doggr/wellfinder/#openModal/-118.00909/33.92186/12">State of California</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In its landmark vote in January, the City Council moved to draft an ordinance that would ban all new oil wells, and it ordered a study to determine how to phase out and decommission existing wells over the next five years. </p>
<p>The state, meanwhile, has proposed a <a href="https://www.gov.ca.gov/2021/10/21/california-moves-to-prevent-new-oil-drilling-near-communities-expand-health-protections-2/">3,200-foot setback rule for new wells</a>, but this has not yet gone into effect and does little to address health concerns for residents who live near existing wells. Gov. Gavin Newsom has also <a href="https://www.gov.ca.gov/2021/04/23/governor-newsom-takes-action-to-phase-out-oil-extraction-in-california/">proposed to phase out oil extraction</a>, but the proposal would allow oil wells to continue operating until 2045. </p>
<p>Our research shows why a variety of policies, including buffers, phaseouts and emissions controls in existing wells will need to be considered to protect public health and accelerate the transition to cleaner energy sources.</p>
<p><em>This updates an <a href="https://theconversation.com/urban-oil-wells-linked-to-asthma-and-other-health-problems-in-los-angeles-160162">article</a> originally published June 2, 2021.</em> </p>
<p>[<em>Get the best of The Conversation, every weekend.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybest">Sign up for our weekly newsletter</a>.\</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/175983/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jill Johnston works at the University of Southern California. This research was supported in part by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bhavna Shamasunder works at Occidental College. This research was supported in part by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the 11th Hour Project. </span></em></p>Photos from the early 1900s show LA’s forests of oil derricks. Hundreds of wells are still pumping, and research shows how people living nearby are struggling with breathing problems.Jill Johnston, Assistant Professor of Preventive Medicine, University of Southern CaliforniaBhavna Shamasunder, Associate Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1707642021-10-29T12:36:39Z2021-10-29T12:36:39ZHow much longer will Major League Baseball stay in the closet?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429168/original/file-20211028-23-1s0j8ki.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=9%2C9%2C6211%2C4138&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">While the league has taken steps to make baseball more welcoming for LGBTQ employees and fans, no active player has come out.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/vanessa-williams-proposes-to-her-girlfriend-megan-coombs-in-news-photo/1310310612?adppopup=true">Spencer Platt/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In his 1990 autobiography, “<a href="https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-451-17029-3">Behind the Mask: My Double Life in Baseball</a>,” Dave Pallone, a gay major league umpire who was quietly fired in 1988 after rumors about his sexual orientation circulated in the baseball world, contended that there were enough gay major league players to create an All-Star team.</p>
<p>Since then, attitudes and laws about homosexuality have changed. High-profile figures in business, politics, show business, education, the media, the military and sports have come out of the closet. </p>
<p>Athletes in three of the five major U.S. male team sports – the NBA, NFL and MLS – have come out while still playing, with <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-its-such-a-big-deal-that-the-nfls-carl-nassib-came-out-as-gay-163228">NFL player Carl Nassib</a> and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/19/us/luke-prokop-comes-out-nhl-trnd/index.html">NHL prospect Luke Prokop</a> coming out in summer 2021. Meanwhile, <a href="https://www.outsports.com/olympics/2021/7/12/22565574/tokyo-summer-olympics-lgbtq-gay-athletes-list">according to OutSports magazine</a>, at least 185 publicly out LGBTQ athletes – 90% of them women – participated in the Tokyo Olympic Games, more than in all previous Summer Olympics combined.</p>
<p>But among the <a href="https://www.baseball-reference.com/">more than 20,000 men</a> who have played major league baseball, not one has publicly come out of the closet while still in uniform.</p>
<p>What’s taken so long? And is baseball ready for its gay Jackie Robinson? </p>
<h2>Two ex-players pave the way</h2>
<p>“I think we’re getting close,” <a href="http://billybean.com/">Billy Bean</a>, the only openly gay former major league player alive today, recently told me. “We’re making incredible strides.” </p>
<p>Bean played for the Detroit Tigers, Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres for parts of six seasons, hiding his homosexuality from his friends, fans and teammates at great emotional cost. He quit baseball in 1995 and four years later publicly came out. In 2003 he published a book, “<a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/Going_the_Other_Way.html?id=ngidGSutPvUC">Going the Other Way: Lessons from a Life In and Out of Major League Baseball</a>,” in which he describes the anguish of being a closeted ballplayer. In 2014, then-Commissioner Bud Selig hired Bean as Major League Baseball’s first Ambassador for Inclusion.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429161/original/file-20211028-26-1ovgbwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Man gazes out window." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429161/original/file-20211028-26-1ovgbwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429161/original/file-20211028-26-1ovgbwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=799&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429161/original/file-20211028-26-1ovgbwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=799&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429161/original/file-20211028-26-1ovgbwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=799&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429161/original/file-20211028-26-1ovgbwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1004&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429161/original/file-20211028-26-1ovgbwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1004&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429161/original/file-20211028-26-1ovgbwd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1004&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">After retiring from baseball, Glenn Burke talked about the difficulties of coming out as a professional athlete.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/AIDSBurke/ad2a4d54728241889454cc61fb5b5e4e/photo?Query=glenn%20burke&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:asc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=33&currentItemNo=9">AP Photo/Mark Hundley</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Bean was the second major league baseball player to come out of the closet after hanging up his spikes. The first, Glenn Burke, played for the Dodgers and Oakland Athletics between 1976 and 1979. He came out publicly in 1982 in an Inside Sports article, “<a href="https://deadspin.com/the-double-life-of-a-gay-dodger-493697377">The Double Life of a Gay Dodger</a>.”</p>
<p>“It’s harder to be gay in sports than anywhere else, except maybe president,” said Burke. “Baseball is probably the hardest sport of all.”</p>
<p>In his autobiography, “<a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.ca/books/318320/out-at-home-by-glenn-burke-erik-sherman/9780698196612">Out at Home</a>,” published shortly after he died of AIDS in 1995, Burke recalled: “I got used to the ‘fag’ jokes. You heard them everywhere then.”</p>
<p>No other ex-major league baseball player – much less one still in uniform – has yet followed in Bean’s and Burke’s footsteps.</p>
<h2>A lingering stain of homophobia</h2>
<p>What’s stopping LGBTQ baseball players from coming out publicly?</p>
<p>Perhaps they calculate that the personal or financial costs still outweigh the benefits.</p>
<p>There is a strong current of fundamentalist Christianity within baseball, which could make life uncomfortable for openly gay players. <a href="https://religioninpublic.blog/2018/02/12/i-want-thank-god-for-allowing-my-team-to-win-an-analysis-of-sports-and-christianity/">One study of Bible verses in pro athlete’s Twitter bios concluded</a> that major league baseball players were “far and away the most overtly religious group of athletes of the four major sporting leagues.”</p>
<p>There are also lingering strands of explicit homophobia.</p>
<p>In 2012, Detroit Tigers outfielder Torii Hunter <a href="https://www.latimes.com/sports/la-xpm-2012-dec-31-la-sp-sn-torii-hunter-gay-athletes-20121231-story.html">told the Los Angeles Times</a> that he’d be uncomfortable with a gay teammate, because “biblically, it’s not right.”</p>
<p>In 2015, Houston Astros slugger Lance Berkman, an evangelical Christian, campaigned against the city’s Equal Rights Ordinance, designed to protect LGBTQ rights. “To me,” <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/early-lead/wp/2015/11/05/retired-mlb-star-lance-berkman-declares-tolerance-is-killing-our-country/">Berkman said at the time</a>, “tolerance is the virtue that’s killing this country.” The ordinance was defeated.</p>
<p>Other MLB players have made homophobic comments over the years, including <a href="http://www.espn.com/mlb/news/1999/1222/247659.html">John Rocker</a>, <a href="http://www.espn.com/mlb/news/2001/0502/1190420.html">Julian Tavarez</a>, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/sports/baseball/yunel-escobar-suspended-3-games-for-slur-on-eye-black.html">Yunel Escobar</a>, <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/cubs/2018/08/26/cubs-laura-ricketts-co-owner-daniel-murphy-anti-gay-comments-trade/1104636002/">Daniel Murphy</a> and <a href="https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/2003/0429/1546815.html">Todd Jones</a>, along with manager <a href="https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/story?id=2496753">Ozzie Guillen</a>.</p>
<h2>Changes start at the top</h2>
<p>Even as players on big-league rosters stay in the closet, MLB and individual teams have taken steps to make baseball more inclusive for LGBTQ employees and fans.</p>
<p>In 2009, when the Ricketts family purchased the Chicago Cubs, <a href="https://www.chicagomag.com/chicago-magazine/may-2020/women-power-50/laura-ricketts/">Laura Ricketts</a> became the first openly LGBTQ person to own a professional sports team. <a href="https://www.tennismajors.com/our-features/on-this-day/may-1st-1981-the-day-billie-jean-king-was-outed-138210.html">Billie Jean King</a>, the former tennis star who, in 1981, became the first openly gay high-profile sports figure, is now part-owner of the Dodgers. </p>
<p>At least four teams – the Dodgers, Baltimore Orioles, San Francisco Giants and Arizona Diamondbacks – now have openly gay top-tier executives. Bean has started a program to recruit and mentor more LGBTQ people to work for teams’ front offices at the major and minor league levels.</p>
<p>In 2000, a lesbian couple <a href="https://www.outsports.com/2011/7/18/4051562/moment-84-lesbian-couple-ejected-from-dodgers-stadium-for-kissing">was ejected from Dodger Stadium for kissing</a>. Today, out of 30 MLB teams, <a href="https://www.outsports.com/2021/6/14/22532482/houston-astros-texas-rangers-lgbtq-pride">only the Texas Rangers have never hosted an LGBTQ Pride event of some kind</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Fans walk past a Boston Red Sox logo with a Progress Pride flag superimposed over it." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429165/original/file-20211028-25-18n3xci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429165/original/file-20211028-25-18n3xci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429165/original/file-20211028-25-18n3xci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429165/original/file-20211028-25-18n3xci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429165/original/file-20211028-25-18n3xci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429165/original/file-20211028-25-18n3xci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429165/original/file-20211028-25-18n3xci.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">All major league baseball teams, save for one, have held a Pride Night.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/pride-night-banner-hangs-in-the-concourse-as-walk-by-before-news-photo/1322950569?adppopup=true">Adam Glanzman/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Several teams have fined or suspended players, managers, and at least one broadcaster – the Cincinnati Reds’ <a href="https://www.si.com/mlb/2020/09/25/thom-brennaman-reds-broadcast-resign">Thom Brennaman</a> – for uttering anti-gay slurs. And despite the occasional homophobic epithet that continues to emerge from their ranks, more and more straight baseball players have expressed support for the LGBTQ community over the past couple of decades. </p>
<p>In 2003, Colorado Rockies star Mark Grace <a href="https://www.outsports.com/2013/2/26/4033832/pitcher-todd-jones-doesnt-like-gay-people">told the Denver Post</a> that most ballplayers wouldn’t be threatened by the idea of a gay teammate. “I’ve played for 16 years, and I’m sure I’ve had homosexual teammates that I didn’t know about.”</p>
<p>Added Grace: “I think if you’re intelligent at all, you’d understand that homosexuals are just like us.”</p>
<p>In 2005, Reds outfielder Ken Griffey Jr. <a href="https://www.espn.com/espn/news/story?id=2035653">said that having a gay teammate</a> “wouldn’t bother me at all. If you can play, you can play.” And in 2018, after <a href="https://www.outsports.com/2018/8/3/17647030/ranking-the-apologies-of-major-league-baseball-players-for-their-anti-gay-tweets">the media highlighted a rash of anti-gay slurs</a> tweeted by several major league ballplayers, pitcher Sean Doolittle <a href="https://twitter.com/whatwoulddoodo/status/1024054958092627968?lang=en">tweeted a full-throated defense</a>: “Some of the strongest people I know are from the LGBTQ community. It takes courage to be your true self when your identity has been used as an insult or a pejorative.”</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1024054958092627968"}"></div></p>
<h2>No perfect time</h2>
<p>The first gay major league baseball player to come out will not be a matter of if, but when.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.outsports.com/2015/1/27/7904811/poll-large-majority-americans-favor-openly-gay-athletes">A 2015 poll</a> found that 73% of Americans – including a majority of white evangelical Christians – said they would support a pro sports team signing an openly gay or lesbian athlete. </p>
<p>Some hope that the first pro ballplayer to come out will be a star. In 2014, Pallone, the gay former umpire, <a href="https://www.foxsports.com/stories/other/a-chat-with-dave-pallone-first-mlb-umpire-to-come-out-as-gay">told Fox Sports</a> that he wanted it to be “a player whose name rolls off somebody’s tongue. That’s what will do the most good.”</p>
<p>Or the first gay big-leaguer could simply emerge from the prospect pipeline. In the past decade, two openly gay ballplayers – David Denson and Sean Conroy – played in the minor leagues. A third minor leaguer, Bryan Ruby, played as an infielder for the Salem-Keizer Volcanoes, part of an independent professional league in Oregon, <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/2021/09/02/bryan-ruby-only-active-professional-baseball-player-out-gay/8244571002/">came out in September 2021</a>. There are <a href="https://www.outsports.com/2020/4/1/21199294/gay-college-baseball-brett-lysohir-coming-out">growing</a> <a href="https://www.outsports.com/2018/4/23/17238344/michael-holland-felician-baseball-gay-coming-out">numbers</a> of openly gay college players, and the best of them could ascend the professional ranks into the majors.</p>
<p>“When I was playing, homosexuality was a taboo topic. We never talked openly about it,” Bean said. “Gay athletes in high school, college and the minors now have role models.”</p>
<p>There will always be some who argue that the time isn’t ripe for a major breakthrough. But as Jon Buzinski, the founder of OutSports, told me: “Everybody will say, ‘We aren’t ready.’ Society was not ready for Jackie Robinson. If you are going to wait for everybody to be ready, nobody will do it.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/170764/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Dreier does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Among the more than 20,000 men who have played major league baseball, not one has publicly come out of the closet while still in uniform.Peter Dreier, E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of Politics, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1601622021-06-02T12:26:35Z2021-06-02T12:26:35ZUrban oil wells linked to asthma and other health problems in Los Angeles<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403471/original/file-20210530-22-hfz0x0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C17%2C2986%2C1976&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Hundreds of active oil wells are hiding in plain sight across the Los Angeles area.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/jet-lands-at-los-angeles-international-airport-as-oil-rigs-news-photo/80864709">David McNew/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a goal to <a href="https://www.gov.ca.gov/2021/04/23/governor-newsom-takes-action-to-phase-out-oil-extraction-in-california/">phase out oil drilling</a> statewide by 2045, he focused on its <a href="https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/global-greenhouse-gas-emissions-data">impact on climate change</a>. But oil drilling is also a health problem, particularly in Los Angeles, where thousands of oil wells still dot the city. </p>
<p>These wells can emit toxic chemicals such as benzene and other irritants into the air, often just feet from homes, schools and parks.</p>
<p>As <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=t4m6sjAAAAAJ&hl=en">environmental health</a> <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Bhavna-Shamasunder">researchers</a>, we study the impacts of oil drilling on surrounding communities. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">Our research</a> shows that <a href="http://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15010138">people living near these urban oil operations</a> suffer higher rates of asthma than average, as well as wheezing, eye irritation and sore throats. In some cases, the impact on residents’ lungs is worse than living beside a highway or being exposed to secondhand smoke every day. </p>
<h2>LA was once an oil town with forests of derricks</h2>
<p>Over a century ago, before Hollywood, the <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3985379">first industry to boom</a> in Los Angeles was oil. </p>
<p>Oil was abundant and flowed close to the surface. In early 20th-century California, sparse laws governed mineral extraction, and rights to oil accrued to those who could pull it out of the ground first. This ushered in a period of rampant drilling, with wells and associated machinery crisscrossing the landscape. By the mid-1920s, Los Angeles was one of the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3985379?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents">largest oil-exporting regions</a> in the world. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A historic black-and-white photo shows a street with houses, old cars and dozens of oil derricks on the hill behind them." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402241/original/file-20210523-102683-u0ildq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A 1924 photo shows the oil derricks on Signal Hill.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_City_Views%20(1925%20+).html">Water and Power Museum Archive</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An old black-and-white photo of a roller coaster on a pier, with the city behind it and then a long row of oil derricks behind that on a ridge." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402245/original/file-20210523-23-dk3nal.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The view across The Pike amusement park and downtown Long Beach, California, in 1940 shows a forest of oil derricks in the background.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_City_Views%20(1925%20+).html">Water and Power Museum Archive</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Oil rigs were so pervasive across the region that the Los Angeles Times described them in 1930 as “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jas079">trees in a forest</a>.” Working-class communities were initially supportive of the industry because it promised jobs but later <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3985379">pushed back</a> as their neighborhoods witnessed explosions and oil spills, along with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-004-1159-0">longer-term damage to land, water and human health</a>.</p>
<p>Tensions over land use, extraction rights and subsequent drops in oil prices due to overproduction eventually resulted in curbs on drilling and a long-standing practice of oil companies’ voluntary “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jas079">self-regulation</a>,” such as noise-reduction technologies. The industry began touting these voluntary approaches to deflect governmental regulation.</p>
<p>Increasingly, oil companies disguised their activities with approaches such as operating <a href="https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/hidden-oil-wells/">inside buildings, building tall walls</a> and <a href="https://lbbusinessjournal.com/thums-oil-islands-half-a-century-later-still-unique-still-iconic">designing islands off Long Beach</a> and other sites to blend in with the landscape. Oil drilling was hidden in plain sight. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A silhouetted student with a backpack walks past an oil derrick covered with drawings of flowers outside a school." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403472/original/file-20210530-17-ozo882.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Beverly Hills High School earned money from an oil well, hidden behind walls covered with flower drawings, that operated until 2017 but raised health concerns.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/decorative-flowery-exterior-masks-an-oil-rig-along-olympic-news-photo/566019401">Luis Sinco/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Today there are over 20,000 active, idle or abandoned wells spread across a county of 10 million people. About <a href="https://news.usc.edu/184929/urban-oil-wells-drilling-lung-health-los-angeles-usc-research/">one-third of residents</a> live less than a mile from an active well site, <a href="https://maps.conservation.ca.gov/doggr/wellfinder/#openModal/-118.23225/33.87983/12">some right next door</a>.</p>
<p>Since the 2000s, the advance of extractive technologies to access harder-to-reach deposits has led to a resurgence of oil extraction activities. As extraction in some neighborhoods has ramped up, people living in South Los Angeles and other neighborhoods in oil fields have noticed frequent <a href="https://www.latimes.com/local/la-xpm-2013-sep-21-la-me-0922-oil-20130922-story.html">odors, nosebleeds and headaches</a>. </p>
<h2>Closer to urban oil drilling, poorer lung function</h2>
<p>The City of Los Angeles currently requires no buffers or setbacks between oil extraction and homes. Approximately <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">75% of active oil or gas wells are located within 500 meters</a> (1,640 feet) of “sensitive land uses,” such as homes, schools, child care facilities, parks or senior residential facilities.</p>
<p>Despite that proximity and over a century of oil drilling in Los Angeles, there have been few studies on how it affects residents’ health. We have been working with <a href="https://envhealthcenters.usc.edu/2021/04/harnessing-the-expertise-of-community-health-workers-for-environmental-health-research.html">community health workers</a> to gauge the impact oil wells are having on residents, particularly on its historically Black and Hispanic neighborhoods.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cSfXx7cMNWc?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Oil drilling in Los Angeles.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The first step was a door-to-door survey of 813 neighbors from 203 households near wells in Las Cienegas oilfield, just south and west of downtown. We found that <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15010138">asthma</a> was significantly more common among people living near South Los Angeles oil wells than among residents of <a href="https://ask.chis.ucla.edu">Los Angeles County as a whole</a>. Nearly half the people we spoke with, 45%, didn’t know oil wells were operating nearby, and 63% didn’t know how to contact local regulatory authorities to report odors or environmental hazards. </p>
<p>Next, we measured lung function of 747 long-term residents, ages 10 to 85, living near two drilling sites. Poor lung capacity, measured as the amount of air a person can exhale after taking a deep breath, and lung strength, how strongly the person can exhale, and are both predictors of health problems including <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10654-012-9750-2">respiratory disease, death from cardiovascular problems</a> and <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/thorax.58.5.388">early death in general</a>.</p>
<p>We found that the closer someone lived to an active or recently idle well site, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2021.111088">the poorer that person’s lung function</a>, even after adjusting for such other risk factors as smoking, asthma and living near a freeway. This research demonstrates a significant relationship between living near oil wells and worsened lung health.</p>
<p>People living up to 1,000 meters (0.6 miles) downwind of a well site showed lower lung function on average than those living farther away and upwind. The effect on their lungs’ capacity and strength was similar to impacts of living near a freeway or, for women, being exposed to secondhand smoke.</p>
<p><iframe id="4KEam" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/4KEam/14/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Using a community monitoring network in South Los Angeles, we were able to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2020.117519">distinguish oil-related pollution</a> in neighborhoods near wells. We found short-term spikes of air pollutants and methane, a potent greenhouse gas, at monitors <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.146194">less than 500 meters, about one-third of a mile, from oil sites</a>.</p>
<p>When oil production at a site <a href="https://doi.org/10.1039/D1EM00048A">stopped</a>, we observed significant reductions in such toxins as benzene, toluene and n-hexane in the air in adjacent neighborhoods. These <a href="https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/ToxProfiles/tp123-p.pdf">chemicals</a> are known irritants, carcinogens and reproductive toxins. They are also associated with dizziness, headaches, fatigue, tremors and respiratory system irritation, including difficulty breathing and, at higher levels, impaired lung function. </p>
<h2>Vulnerable communities at risk</h2>
<p>Many of the dozens of active oil wells in South Los Angeles are in historically Black and Hispanic communities that have been marginalized for decades. These neighborhoods are already considered among the <a href="https://oehha.ca.gov/calenviroscreen/report/calenviroscreen-30">most highly polluted, with the most vulnerable residents</a> in the state.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Map showing active well sites." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403473/original/file-20210530-15-1w5wltk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A state app called well finder locates active oil wells, including in Los Angeles County.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://maps.conservation.ca.gov/doggr/wellfinder/#openModal/-118.00909/33.92186/12">State of California</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But while the governor declared that “<a href="https://www.gov.ca.gov/2021/04/23/governor-newsom-takes-action-to-phase-out-oil-extraction-in-california/">California needs to move beyond oil</a>,” his current timeline would allow oil wells to continue operating for the next two decades. A variety of policies, including buffers, phaseouts and emissions controls, will need to be considered to protect public health and accelerate the transition to cleaner energy sources.</p>
<p>[<em>Get the best of The Conversation, every weekend.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybest">Sign up for our weekly newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/160162/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jill Johnston receives funding from NIH and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bhavna Shamasunder receives funding from NIH, NSF, and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation </span></em></p>Photos from the early 1900s show LA’s forests of oil derricks. Hundreds of wells are still pumping, and new research finds people living nearby are struggling with breathing problems.Jill Johnston, Assistant Professor of Preventive Medicine, University of Southern CaliforniaBhavna Shamasunder, Associate Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1498052021-01-27T13:27:35Z2021-01-27T13:27:35ZBiden faces the world: 5 foreign policy experts explain US priorities – and problems – after Trump<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380532/original/file-20210125-13-zei5us.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C26%2C4473%2C3019&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Can Joe Biden restore U.S. world leadership?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/president-elect-joe-biden-waves-as-he-arrives-to-deliver-news-photo/1229521571?adppopup=true">Agela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Editor’s note: President Joe Biden inherits from Donald Trump a United States that was simultaneously isolated from the rest of the world and openly hostile toward parts of it. Biden – <a href="https://theconversation.com/bidens-long-foreign-policy-record-signals-how-hell-reverse-trump-rebuild-old-alliances-and-lead-the-pandemic-response-143671">an internationally minded leader who has longstanding relationships with world leaders</a> – has already begun to rejoin treaties and alliances abandoned by Trump.</em></p>
<p><em>Dire domestic crises will keep Biden’s attention focused on home, at least early in his administration, but he says the U.S. is “ready to lead the world.” Here, experts assess the state of American relations with a world left skeptical of American leadership.</em></p>
<h2>Latin America</h2>
<p><em>Jennifer M. Piscopo, Occidental College</em></p>
<p>Latin America’s <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2018/04/12/fewer-people-in-latin-america-see-the-u-s-favorably-under-trump/">faith in U.S. leadership</a>, once buoyed by Obama’s <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/04/07/obama-to-meet-latin-american-leaders-amid-positive-views-of-u-s-in-the-region/">cooperative and collaborative approach</a>, declined under Trump. </p>
<p>The Trump administration ignored authoritarian behavior across the region – <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/04/18/714552854/trump-administration-announces-measures-against-cuba-venezuela-and-nicaragua">except in</a> leftist Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba, where it levied sanctions and even threatened military intervention. Many saw those punishments, which evoke the United States’ history of interference in Latin America’s domestic affairs, as aimed more at <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2019/01/30/trump-venezuela-florida-policy-1138307">winning anti-Communist emigré votes in Florida</a> than helping citizens of those nations.</p>
<p>Nor did tightening the U.S.-Mexico border aid the region’s interests.</p>
<p>Trump made immigration harder while <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/09/17/761266169/trump-froze-aid-to-guatemala-now-programs-are-shutting-down">cutting foreign aid</a> to Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras – none of which addressed the reasons people kept leaving Central America. Migrants were forced to wait out their U.S. asylum process in Mexico, leading <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/23/us/mexico-migrant-camp-asylum.html">refugee camps</a> to pop up along the border. In the United States, asylum-seeking children <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/14/us/politics/trump-family-separation.html">were separated from their parents</a>. Shoddy paperwork has so far made <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/12/11/immigrant-advocates-cant-locate-parents-separated-border-children/3896940001/">reunification impossible</a> for several hundred families. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380529/original/file-20210125-15-d97wct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A migrant boy walks amid tents" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380529/original/file-20210125-15-d97wct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380529/original/file-20210125-15-d97wct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380529/original/file-20210125-15-d97wct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380529/original/file-20210125-15-d97wct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380529/original/file-20210125-15-d97wct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380529/original/file-20210125-15-d97wct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380529/original/file-20210125-15-d97wct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Trump’s immigration policies created a humanitarian crisis in places like Tijuana.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/migrant-boy-walks-amid-tents-at-the-juventud-2000-migrant-news-photo/1230184596?adppopup=true">Guillermo Arias/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As Trump limited U.S. involvement and economic support in Latin America, China <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-latam-usa-china-insight/in-latin-america-a-biden-white-house-faces-a-rising-china-idUSKBN28O18R">stepped up its own</a>. Chinese money pays for the region’s mines, energy projects, telecommunications, agriculture, manufacturing, infrastructure, ports and, most recently, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/02/us/politics/coronavirus-southern-command-china-latin-america.html">access to the coronavirus vaccine</a>. The U.S. remains <a href="https://wits.worldbank.org/countrysnapshot/en/mex">Mexico’s largest trading partner</a>, but for the rest of Latin America, the honor goes to China. </p>
<p>Biden <a href="https://www.vice.com/en/article/y3gbvy/mexico-just-postponed-the-legalization-of-weed-to-2021due-to-covid">is expected to</a> reinstate the humanitarian support <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/us-cuts-millions-in-aid-to-central-america-fulfilling-trumps-vow/">Trump cut</a>. And unlike Chinese foreign investment, U.S. money comes <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/how-unconditional-is-chinas-foreign-aid/a-43499703">with conditions that enhance democracy</a> like fighting corruption or keeping elections free and fair.</p>
<p>Still, enthusiasm for democracy in Latin America is waning. Support for democratic governance dropped from about 64% in the mid-2010s to 57% in 2019, <a href="https://news.vanderbilt.edu/2019/10/14/support-for-democracy-in-a-slump-across-americas-according-to-new-survey/">according to polling by Vanderbilt University</a>. From Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro – dubbed the “<a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/01/14/bolsonaro-brazil-trump-anti-democracy-elections/">tropical Trump</a>” – to hard-line leaders in <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-elsalvador-politics/el-salvador-presidents-power-play-stokes-democracy-concerns-idUSKBN2042M4">El Salvador</a> and <a href="https://www.npr.org/2018/06/18/620888643/colombia-elects-right-wing-populist-ivan-duque-as-president">Colombia</a>, the Americas feel the allure of strong-man politics. </p>
<h2>Africa</h2>
<p><em>Julius Amin, University of Dayton</em></p>
<p>China is the United States’ main competitor in Africa, too. </p>
<p>China has forged <a href="https://thediplomat.com/2020/11/chinas-multifaceted-covid-19-diplomacy-across-africa/">strong economic and political ties with the continent</a>, holding summits with African leaders and providing significant development assistance, including to <a href="https://www.chinacenter.net/2020/china_currents/19-2/sino-ethiopian-relations-from-meles-zenawi-to-abiy-ahmed-the-political-economy-of-a-strategic-partnership/">Ethiopia</a>, <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/opinion/south-africa-and-china-what-next-for-relations-between-the-two-countries-49135925">South Africa</a> and
<a href="https://www.theafricareport.com/29060/nigeria-and-china-understanding-the-imbalanced-relationship/">Nigeria</a>. In exchange for investment, it has exploited Africa’s enormous resources: <a href="https://www.wiley.com/en-us/The+New+Scramble+for+Africa%2C+2nd+Edition-p-9781509507085">oil, coffee, rubber, palm oil, diamonds, gold, uranium</a>. </p>
<p>Trump often acted as if Africa was irrelevant, even <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/trump-referred-haiti-african-countries-shithole-nations-n836946">crudely insulting the region</a>. His rejection of the Paris Climate Agreement and membership in the <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/19/us/trump-who-funding-threat-explainer-intl/index.html">World Health Organization</a> translated into significant loss of money destined to help <a href="https://www.un.org/africarenewal/magazine/april-2016/paris-climate-deal-and-africa">African countries</a>. So did his <a href="https://www.voanews.com/usa/us-politics/trump-again-proposes-big-cut-foreign-aid">slashing of foreign aid</a>. Trump was the first U.S. president this century not to visit Africa. </p>
<p>But Africa plays an important role in the <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-the-african-union-has-failed-to-silence-the-guns-and-some-solutions-139567">global war against jihadism</a> and it has both young democracies and old autocracies – all strategic U.S. interests.</p>
<p>Biden can still reverse Africa’s drift toward China. Though <a href="https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2014/08/06/statement-chair-us-africa-leaders-summit">promises made at the Obama administration’s 2014 U.S.-Africa summit</a>, which Biden participated in as vice president, were not fulfilled, African leaders overwhelmingly <a href="https://www.aa.com.tr/en/africa/african-leaders-welcome-bidens-us-election-win/2035990">welcomed Biden’s victory in November</a>. </p>
<p>Appointing experienced foreign policy staff to cover the region would build on that momentum. And since a large number of State Department professionals <a href="http://www.beacon.org/cw_Search.aspx?k=When+the+World+Calls%3a+The+Inside+Story+of+the+Peace+Corps+an">began their foreign service careers as Peace Corps volunteers in Africa</a>, Biden has a rich talent pool to choose from. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380528/original/file-20210125-19-1l9gguz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Biden signing an executive order at the Resolute Desk" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380528/original/file-20210125-19-1l9gguz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380528/original/file-20210125-19-1l9gguz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380528/original/file-20210125-19-1l9gguz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380528/original/file-20210125-19-1l9gguz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380528/original/file-20210125-19-1l9gguz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380528/original/file-20210125-19-1l9gguz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380528/original/file-20210125-19-1l9gguz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Biden’s first move in office was to rejoin the WHO and Paris Climate Accord.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/joe-biden-signs-an-executive-order-in-the-oval-office-news-photo/1230739438?adppopup=true">Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>China</h2>
<p><em>Joyce Mao, Middlebury</em></p>
<p>With China, Biden inherits the same challenges Trump faced and failed to resolve, from a <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/truth-about-tariffs?gclid=CjwKCAiAi_D_BRApEiwASslbJ5i8yAHS9L3acpwnMDRXSnslULSLmnZjoFFQRV8sOh4PdQh1k1w3vBoCPioQAvD_BwE">massive trade deficit</a> to Chinese misappropriation of American <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/us-chinas-cold-war-raging-cyberspace-where-intellectual-property-costly-front-1532133">intellectual property</a>. </p>
<p>Then there is the <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2020/12/south-china-sea-us-ghosts-strategic-tensions/617380/">South China Sea</a>, where China’s territorial claims to strategic islands threaten U.S. access to natural resources and to shipping routes. Over the past decade the U.S. has used both <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-defence/exclusive-satellite-images-reveal-show-of-force-by-chinese-navy-in-south-china-sea-idUSKBN1H3135">military</a> <a href="https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3116967/us-china-grey-zone-rivalry-south-china-sea-may-be-about">resources</a> and <a href="https://www.fpri.org/article/2020/08/from-pivot-to-defiance-american-policy-shift-in-the-south-china-sea/">heated rhetoric</a> to counter Chinese maneuvers there, as have Southeast Asian countries like <a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-at-stake-in-chinas-claims-to-the-south-china-sea-62472">the Philippines</a>. But the South China Sea remains a contentious issue. </p>
<p>Biden has promised to “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/02/opinion/biden-interview-mcconnell-china-iran.html">fight like hell</a>” to defend America’s global standing against China’s growing power, using more collaborative rhetoric than Trump. But the new president <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2021/1/1/bidens-china-policy-balancing-engagement-with-deterrence">has not yet signaled</a> a new grand strategy that will ensure consistency, let alone the primacy of American interests.</p>
<h2>Europe</h2>
<p><em>Garret Martin, American University</em></p>
<p>Following <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-a-biden-presidency-means-for-europe-149696">four tumultuous years under Donald Trump</a>, the Biden administration wants to <a href="https://www.euractiv.com/section/global-europe/news/biden-pushes-new-approach-to-eu-in-calls-to-leaders/">repair fractured U.S. relations with the European Union</a>, and fast.</p>
<p>Immediately after taking office, Biden <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/paris-climate-accord-biden-rejoin-president/">rejoined the Paris climate accords</a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/2020/11/9/21556172/trump-biden-transition-team-covid-19-who-join">World Health Organization</a>, <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/live-blog-europe-reacts-to-joe-biden-inauguration/">endearing him to European allies</a>. Unlike Trump, he deeply respects NATO, a decades-old transatlantic security partnership Biden has called the “<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/16/politics/biden-showcases-foreign-policy-munich/index.html">single most significant military alliance in the world</a>.” America’s European partners will also welcome <a href="https://www.vox.com/21594368/joe-biden-blinken-sullivan-haines-foreign-policy-team">a return to more predictable relations</a> with the U.S. under Biden and an end to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/13/trump-macron-eu-army-german-second-world-war">diplomacy by tweets</a>. </p>
<p>But changes in tone and style will not necessarily change the substance of America’s transatlantic partnership. For all the focus on Trump, the European Union and U.S. still <a href="https://carnegieeurope.eu/strategiceurope/83191">disagree on key matters</a>, such as data privacy, how to deal with China and to what extent Europe can tax American tech giants. </p>
<p>Europeans remain <a href="https://theconversation.com/america-is-back-the-delusion-of-normalcy-that-haunts-the-united-states-153567">wary of the United States’ profound polarization</a>. Is it worth investing time in negotiating long-term deals with a country whose <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2020/09/26/politics/trump-european-union-diplomacy-intl-analysis/index.html">policies swing so dramatically from one administration to the next</a>?</p>
<h2>Middle East and South Asia</h2>
<p><em>Muqtedar Khan, University of Delaware</em></p>
<p>Beyond the ongoing Israel-Palestinian conflict, Biden faces two Mideast problems that deteriorated during the Trump administration’s idiosyncratic watch. </p>
<p>The first is an <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/25765949.2020.1760542">emerging tension</a> between Arab nations and the non-Arab nations. Iran and Turkey <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrgver1b32E&t=3s">are challenging two of America’s Arab allies, Saudi Arabia and Egypt</a>, for political and military domination of the region. </p>
<p>Trump tried military might and punishment to control Iran, <a href="https://theconversation.com/donald-trump-backs-out-of-iran-nuclear-deal-now-what-96317">exiting the international Iran nuclear deal</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/killing-of-soleimani-evokes-dark-history-of-political-assassinations-in-the-formative-days-of-shiite-islam-129505">assassinating a revered general</a>. Biden says he may rejoin the Iran deal. But American relations with Iran have <a href="https://theconversation.com/us-and-iran-have-a-long-troubled-history-129844">rarely been worse</a>. The Trump administration tried diplomatic <a href="https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/how-trumps-team-appeased-turkey-up-until-its-final-months-in-office-649350">appeasement to manage Turkey</a>, a fellow NATO member. Still it continues to undermine America’s Mideast allies and <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/14/us-sanctions-turkey-over-russian-s400.html">upset Washington by buying weapons from Russia</a>. Biden may be less conciliatory.</p>
<p>The second big problem Biden contends with in the Middle East is its many fragile and <a href="https://time.com/4092987/these-5-failing-middle-eastern-states-may-be-unsalvagable/">failing states</a>, from Yemen and Libya to Syria, Iraq and Sudan. Failing states generate instability, refugees and <a href="https://carnegieendowment.org/2017/03/29/refugees-and-displacement-in-middle-east-pub-68479">humanitarian crises</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380537/original/file-20210125-13-14xxq21.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A extremely skinny 10-year-old child squats next to her mother, on the dirt ground" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380537/original/file-20210125-13-14xxq21.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380537/original/file-20210125-13-14xxq21.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380537/original/file-20210125-13-14xxq21.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380537/original/file-20210125-13-14xxq21.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380537/original/file-20210125-13-14xxq21.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380537/original/file-20210125-13-14xxq21.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380537/original/file-20210125-13-14xxq21.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Yemeni refugee camp in Hajjah Governorate, Jan. 23, 2021. Parts of Yemen are experiencing mass hunger due to civil war.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/yemeni-10-year-old-girl-ahmadia-abdo-who-weighs-ten-news-photo/1230750390?adppopup=true">Essa Ahmed/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Historically, the U.S. has been extremely engaged in the Mideast. It has invested over <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-war-anniversary/iraq-war-costs-u-s-more-than-2-trillion-study-idUSBRE92D0PG20130314">US$2 trillion to bring democracy to Iraq since 2002</a>. The U.S. negotiated with Iran and brokered more <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-11103745">than a dozen</a> Israel-related peace deals since 1978. Biden’s foreign policy team is likely to focus on the region, too. </p>
<p>As China’s global power grows, South Asia is becoming more critical to U.S. foreign policy, too. </p>
<p>It is home to two nuclear powers – <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/southern-asias-nuclear-powers">India and Pakistan</a> – and the world’s largest democracy, India. Trump was <a href="https://theconversation.com/howdy-modi-in-houston-why-indias-narendra-modi-puts-so-much-effort-into-wooing-the-diaspora-123946">close to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi</a>, and his administration <a href="https://www.state.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Free-and-Open-Indo-Pacific-4Nov2019.pdf">recognized India</a> – along with Australia and Japan – as key to restraining rising Chinese power in South Asia. Biden may endorse a softer China policy, which <a href="https://www.orfonline.org/expert-speak/biden-and-the-indo-pacific-will-regional-powers-shape-americas-approach/">would change, and potentially weaken</a>, U.S. relations with India. </p>
<p>Finally, there’s Afghanistan. In February 2020 the U.S. signed <a href="https://www.state.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/02.29.20-US-Afghanistan-Joint-Declaration.pdf">a peace deal with the Taliban insurgents</a> to end its 19-year war there. For the remaining U.S. troops to come home, however, the Taliban must also strike a deal with the Afghan government, which it has long sought to overthrow. Peace is far from guaranteed.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/149805/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Muqtedar Khan receives funding from the Department of State via University of Delaware.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Garret Martin receives funding from the European Union for the Transatlantic Policy Center, which he co-directs.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jennifer M. Piscopo, Joyce Mao, and Julius A. Amin do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Biden wants to restore US global leadership after four years of Trump’s isolationism and antagonism. These are some of the challenges and opportunities he’ll face, from China to Latin America.Muqtedar Khan, Professor, Islam and Global Affairs, University of DelawareGarret Martin, Senior Professorial Lecturer, Co-Director Transatlantic Policy Center, American University School of International ServiceJennifer M. Piscopo, Associate Professor of Politics, Occidental CollegeJoyce Mao, Associate professor of history, MiddleburyJulius A. Amin, Professor, Department of History, University of DaytonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1488442020-10-26T15:42:20Z2020-10-26T15:42:20ZChile abolishes its dictatorship-era constitution in groundbreaking vote for a more inclusive democracy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/365537/original/file-20201026-13-e4nmro.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=140%2C241%2C6569%2C4225&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Chileans celebrate victory after the referendum, in Santiago, Chile, Oct. 25, 2020.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-gather-to-celebrate-the-victory-of-the-referendum-in-news-photo/1229286678?adppopup=true">Felipe Vargas Figueroa/NurPhoto via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>One year ago, Chileans took their <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-chile-protests-explainer/explainer-chiles-inequality-challenge-what-went-wrong-and-can-it-be-fixed-idUSKBN1X22RK">anger over inequality and injustice</a> to the streets, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/11/5/chile-protests-chileans-demand-new-constitution-amid-unrest">insisting that redressing the nation’s deep structural problems would require</a> more than reform. They said Chile would need a new constitution with more rights and better social protections. </p>
<p>On Oct. 25, in a popular referendum, the rest of the country <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/25/world/americas/chile-constitution-plebiscite.html">overwhelmingly agreed with their diagnosis</a>. </p>
<p>Chile’s referendum asked voters two questions: Should Chile convene a constitutional convention to write a brand-new constitution? If so, who should write that constitution – an assembly comprising half congressional representatives and half citizens, or an assembly comprising just citizens? </p>
<p>With 79% of the vote, Chileans <a href="https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-america-latina-54686919">demanded a new constitution written solely by their fellow Chileans</a>.</p>
<p>Our research on <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=HGTSACIAAAAJ&hl=en">democratic governments</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=5xSYuXcAAAAJ&hl=en">women’s political participation</a> explains why Chile’s Oct. 25 vote breaks new ground and could set an example for democracies worldwide. </p>
<p>Countries usually write new constitutions only when <a href="https://www.politicalsettlements.org/portfolio/constitution-making/">wars end</a> or <a href="https://blog.politics.ox.ac.uk/making-arab-spring-constitutions/">when transitioning to democracy</a>. And constitutional conventions composed solely of citizens are practically unheard of. Chile shows what <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/10/12/chile-at-the-barricades">frustrated people in democracies can achieve when they rise up</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A woman in a face mask walks past graffiti reading 'Chile Decides'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363286/original/file-20201013-23-is80f1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=48%2C0%2C5399%2C3321&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363286/original/file-20201013-23-is80f1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=371&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363286/original/file-20201013-23-is80f1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=371&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363286/original/file-20201013-23-is80f1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=371&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363286/original/file-20201013-23-is80f1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=467&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363286/original/file-20201013-23-is80f1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=467&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363286/original/file-20201013-23-is80f1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=467&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">‘Chile Decided’ for change.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/woman-walks-past-a-graffiti-reading-chile-decides-in-news-photo/1228190415?adppopup=true">Martin Bernetti/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A tale of 2 Chiles</h2>
<p>Chile’s current constitution dates back to Augusto Pinochet, the military dictator who governed the South American country from 1973 to 1990. </p>
<p>Pinochet lost power in a 1988 referendum, highlighting the transformative potential of ballot initiatives in Chile. </p>
<p>But even as Chile transitioned to free and fair elections, <a href="http://www.psupress.org/books/titles/0-271-01947-6.html">Pinochet’s legacy persisted</a> in the country’s restrictive, dictatorship-era constitution. It defined <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0010414097030006001">an electoral system</a> that limited the power of the left and favored incumbents, reducing turnover in office. The lack of electoral incentives for politicians to listen to voters <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1866802X1600800303">created an insular and unresponsive political class</a>. </p>
<p>For a while, these problems were masked by Chile’s booming economy. <a href="https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CHL/chile/gdp-growth-rate">The economy grew</a>, on average, 7% annually in the 1990s, and <a href="https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CHL/chile/gdp-growth-rate">continued strong in the new millennium</a>. </p>
<p>The economic boom reduced poverty, but <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/22/opinion/chile-protests.html">the rich got much richer</a>. Thanks to Chile’s free-market economic system – loosely based on the U.S. model but with less regulation – today the wealthiest 10% of Chileans <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/poverty/lac-equity-lab1/income-inequality/income-distribution">receive nearly 40% of the country’s income</a>. Chile is one of <a href="https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/social-issues-migration-health/there-are-large-differences-in-levels-of-income-inequality-across-the-oecd_3129a6e6-en">the most unequal countries among developed nations</a>, worse than the United States. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Chileans wave flags while standing on a graffiti-covered national monument." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=50%2C0%2C5588%2C3705&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chile’s protesters won the right to choose their nation’s future, but not without bloodshed.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-during-a-protest-against-a-wide-range-of-issues-news-photo/1228990130?adppopup=true">Claudio Abarca Sandoval/NurPhoto via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While Chile’s rich and corporations enjoy low taxes, its poor and elderly struggle with nearly no social safety net. While wealthy Chileans visit state-of-the-art private medical clinics staffed with U.S.-trained doctors, the poor rely on public hospitals where they must often <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/oct/27/chile-hundreds-shot-and-beaten-street-protests">buy their own syringes, bandages and drugs</a>. </p>
<p>Chileans have <a href="https://scholarship.richmond.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://scholar.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=1010&context=polisci-faculty-publications">long acknowledged</a> this inequality, but the presidents who followed Pinochet – whether on the left or right – did little to alter this model. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, Latin American governments from Mexico to Brazil <a href="https://academic.oup.com/sp/article-abstract/24/4/345/4775169">invested in the comprehensive redistribution of wealth</a> and passed laws implementing <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1548-2456.2015.00278.x">gender quotas for legislative candidates</a>. Many amended their constitutions to clearly state that historically excluded groups like women and indigenous peoples enjoyed equal rights. Bolivia even <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41261455">wrote a new constitution</a> in 2008 recognizing itself as a multi-ethnic country and protecting Indigenous language, culture and lands. </p>
<p>Chile tried to address simmering unhappiness in 2017, expanding the number of seats in its congress, changing electoral rules to make races more competitive and introducing quotas for women candidates. But it was too little, too late. </p>
<h2>What changed?</h2>
<p>Chileans first took to the streets of the capital, Santiago, over an increase in public transit fares, <a href="https://www.leftvoice.org/timeline-from-student-rebellion-to-general-strike-in-chile">on Oct. 14, 2019. Things turned serious – and violent – overnight on Oct. 18</a>, as ever more people joined the demonstrations in what became known as “el estallido” – the explosion. </p>
<p>The following week, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-50191746">1 million of Chile’s 19 million people marched for reform</a> nationwide, with wide-ranging demands. </p>
<p>Student protesters <a href="https://apnews.com/article/819108269b65dc2dd4dffcfd7712d53a">wanted free higher education</a>. Pensioners <a href="https://apnews.com/article/31ab8e9f5b9a467abdda53616edc72c2">wanted a dignified retirement</a>. Workers <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2019/11/12/chile-workers-unions-strike-in-support-of-ongoing-protests/?gb=true">wanted better wages</a>. Women and feminists <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/06/chile-womens-day-protest">wanted an end to gender violence</a>. </p>
<p>Chileans hope a new constitution with more rights and stronger mandates for such reforms will quell the protests, which <a href="https://en.mercopress.com/2020/10/12/rioting-and-protests-continue-in-chile-against-government-and-police-brutality">paused only during the height of Chile’s pandemic lockdown in spring and early summer</a>.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/aB7r6hdo3W4?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Chilean feminists inspired a global trend with ‘El violador eres tú,’ a choreographed protest dance condemning violence against women.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The fury on the streets continued even after Chile’s congress <a href="https://www.cnnchile.com/pais/toda-oposicion-acuerdo-pide-asamblea-constituyente-plebiscito_20191112/">agreed to hold a referendum</a> on writing a new constitution, and to let voters decide who would draft it. The referendum, originally scheduled for April 26, was postponed until October because of the coronavirus pandemic.</p>
<h2>Women make big gains</h2>
<p>With everyday Chileans writing the country’s new constitution, the decision-making power of the political class will be reduced. </p>
<p>Women will also have a greater voice in Chile’s future. <a href="https://www.eldesconcierto.cl/2019/11/27/nueva-constitucion-no-sin-mujeres/">Just two women</a> were among the 12 authors of its Pinochet-era constitution. But feminist leaders and women in congress insisted “<a href="https://www.latercera.com/paula/nunca-mas-sin-nosotras/">never again without women</a>,” demanding that the citizens elected to the constitutional convention be half women.</p>
<p>[<em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>When the <a href="https://www.emol.com/noticias/Nacional/2019/12/21/971123/Paridad-genero-constitucion-como-funciona.html">men in congress balked</a>, the women stood outside the chamber chanting, “we are half, we want half.” </p>
<p>In December 2019 congress conceded. By law, half of the citizens elected to write Chile’s new constitution must be women. This establishes a groundbreaking global standard for women’s political inclusion.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A woman in a face mask reading 'Sí apruebo.'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A supporter of rewriting the constitution.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/woman-poses-with-a-face-mask-reading-i-approve-ahead-of-the-news-photo/1228658444?adppopup=true">Martin Bernetti/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>The constitutional convention <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/16/world/americas/chile-mapuche-constitution.html">will also reserve seats</a> for Indigenous peoples like the Mapuche, a marginalized group whose ancestral lands <a href="https://www.hrw.org/reports/2004/chile1004/3.htm">have been stolen</a> by the government. </p>
<p>At a time when people worldwide are rising up to demand more equitable and responsive government, from Black Lives Matter in the U.S. to <a href="https://theconversation.com/hong-kong-protesters-dont-identify-as-chinese-amid-anger-at-inequality-survey-suggests-122293">the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong</a>, Chile shows that sustained protests can bring sweeping change. Chileans, young and old, took exceptional risks to improve their country. </p>
<p>A vote to choose the citizen members of Chile’s constitutional convention comes next. At peaceful celebrations across Santiago on Oct. 25, demonstrators chanted, “<a href="https://twitter.com/jwbartlett92/status/1320513536028790790">May 22, May 22</a>” – the date of that election. </p>
<p>Chile’s pro-democracy movement has not all been peaceful or bloodless. </p>
<p>Iconic parts of downtown Santiago were destroyed last year, two-thirds of the city’s <a href="https://www.bnamericas.com/en/news/santiago-metro-80-stations-damaged-or-destroyed-during-protests">metro stations</a> were damaged and 11 were set ablaze and ruined. Police fired on protesters with rubber bullets, and many of those arrested <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/13/world/americas/chile-police-protests.html">reported extreme brutality</a>, including sexual assault and even torture. Hundreds were wounded and <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20200229190253/https://nacla.org/news/2020/02/24/chile-struggle-democratize-state-plebescite">36 were killed</a> between October 2019 and February 2020. </p>
<p>It’s too soon to know whether the protests will subside with the referendum results. But Chile is moving forward with its mandate of change.</p>
<p><em>This is an updated version of an <a href="https://theconversation.com/chile-puts-its-constitution-on-the-ballot-after-year-of-civil-unrest-147832">article</a> originally published Oct. 20, 2020.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/148844/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>After a year of unrest Chileans voted decisively on Oct. 25 to replace their constitution, a relic of the military dictator Pinochet. Civilians, half of them women, will write the new constitution.Jennifer M. Piscopo, Associate Professor of Politics, Occidental CollegePeter Siavelis, Professor, Department of Political Science and International Affairs, Wake Forest UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1478322020-10-20T12:20:30Z2020-10-20T12:20:30ZChile puts its constitution on the ballot after year of civil unrest<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363286/original/file-20201013-23-is80f1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=48%2C0%2C5399%2C3321&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'Chile Decides' whether to change its military dictatorship-era constitution at a popular referendum on Oct. 25.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/woman-walks-past-a-graffiti-reading-chile-decides-in-news-photo/1228190415?adppopup=true">Martin Bernetti/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>One year ago, Chileans took their <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-chile-protests-explainer/explainer-chiles-inequality-challenge-what-went-wrong-and-can-it-be-fixed-idUSKBN1X22RK">anger over inequality and injustice</a> to the streets, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/11/5/chile-protests-chileans-demand-new-constitution-amid-unrest">insisting that redressing the nation’s deep structural problems would require</a> more than reform. They said Chile would need a new constitution with more rights and better social protections. </p>
<p>Soon they will learn whether the rest of the country agrees with their diagnosis. </p>
<p>On Oct. 25, Chile will hold a referendum that asks voters two questions: Should Chile convene a constitutional convention to write a brand-new constitution? If so, who should write that constitution – an assembly comprising half congressional representatives and half citizens, or an assembly comprising just citizens? </p>
<p>Experts predict voters <a href="https://www.elmostrador.cl/dia/2020/10/01/encuesta-criteria-72-votara-apruebo-y-19-rechazo-a-una-nueva-constitucion-en-el-plebiscito/">will vote for a new constitution written by their fellow Chileans</a>.</p>
<p>Our research on <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=HGTSACIAAAAJ&hl=en">democratic governments</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=5xSYuXcAAAAJ&hl=en">women’s political participation</a> explains why Chile’s referendum is, to use a technical political science term, a big deal. </p>
<p>Countries usually write new constitutions only when <a href="https://www.politicalsettlements.org/portfolio/constitution-making/">wars end</a> or <a href="https://blog.politics.ox.ac.uk/making-arab-spring-constitutions/">when transitioning to democracy</a>. And constitutional conventions composed solely of citizens are practically unheard of. Chile shows what <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/10/12/chile-at-the-barricades">frustrated people in democracies can achieve when they rise up</a>.</p>
<h2>A tale of two Chiles</h2>
<p>Chile’s current constitution dates back to Augusto Pinochet, the military dictator who governed the South American country from 1973 to 1990. </p>
<p>Pinochet lost power in a 1988 referendum, highlighting the transformative potential of ballot initiatives in Chile. But even as Chile transitioned to free and fair elections, <a href="http://www.psupress.org/books/titles/0-271-01947-6.html">Pinochet’s legacy persisted</a> in the country’s restrictive, dictatorship-era constitution. It defined <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0010414097030006001">an electoral system</a> that limited the power of the left and favored incumbents, reducing turnover in office. The lack of electoral incentives for politicians to listen to voters <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1866802X1600800303">created an insular and unresponsive political class</a>. </p>
<p>For a while, these problems were masked by Chile’s booming economy. <a href="https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CHL/chile/gdp-growth-rate">The economy grew</a>, on average, 7% annually in the 1990s, and <a href="https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CHL/chile/gdp-growth-rate">continued strong in the new millennium</a>. </p>
<p>The economic boom reduced poverty, but <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/22/opinion/chile-protests.html">the rich got much richer</a>. Thanks to Chile’s free-market economic system – loosely based on the U.S. model but with less regulation – today the wealthiest 10% of Chileans <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/poverty/lac-equity-lab1/income-inequality/income-distribution">receive nearly 40% of income in the country</a>. Chile is one of <a href="https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/social-issues-migration-health/there-are-large-differences-in-levels-of-income-inequality-across-the-oecd_3129a6e6-en">the most unequal countries among developed nations</a>, worse than the United States. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Chileans wave flags while standing on a graffiti-covered national monument." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=50%2C0%2C5588%2C3705&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363284/original/file-20201013-23-jsh9ht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chile’s protesters won the right to choose their nation’s future, but not without bloodshed.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-during-a-protest-against-a-wide-range-of-issues-news-photo/1228990130?adppopup=true">Claudio Abarca Sandoval/NurPhoto via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While Chile’s rich and corporations enjoy low taxes, its poor and elderly struggle with nearly no social safety net. While wealthy Chileans visit state-of-the-art private medical clinics staffed with U.S.-trained doctors, the poor rely on public hospitals where they must often <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/oct/27/chile-hundreds-shot-and-beaten-street-protests">buy their own syringes, bandages and drugs</a>. </p>
<p>Chileans have <a href="https://scholarship.richmond.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://scholar.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=1010&context=polisci-faculty-publications">long acknowledged</a> this inequality, but the presidents who followed Pinochet – whether on the left or right – did little to alter this model. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, Latin American governments from Mexico to Brazil <a href="https://academic.oup.com/sp/article-abstract/24/4/345/4775169">invested in comprehensive redistribution of wealth</a> and passed laws implementing <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1548-2456.2015.00278.x">gender quotas for legislative candidates</a>. Many amended their constitutions to clearly state that historically excluded groups like women and indigenous peoples enjoyed equal rights. Bolivia even <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41261455">wrote a new constitution</a> in 2008 recognizing itself as a multiethnic country and protecting Indigenous language, culture and lands. </p>
<p>Chile tried to address simmering unhappiness in 2017, expanding the number of seats in congress, changing electoral rules to make races more competitive and introducing quotas for women candidates. But it was too little, too late. </p>
<h2>What changed?</h2>
<p>Chileans first took to the streets of the capital, Santiago, over an increase in public transit fares, <a href="https://www.leftvoice.org/timeline-from-student-rebellion-to-general-strike-in-chile">on Oct. 14, 2019. Things turned serious – and violent – overnight on Oct. 18</a>, as ever more people joined the demonstrations in what became known as “el estallido” – the explosion. </p>
<p>The following week, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-50191746">1 million of Chile’s 19 million people marched for reform</a> nationwide, with wide-ranging demands. </p>
<p>Student protesters <a href="https://apnews.com/article/819108269b65dc2dd4dffcfd7712d53a">wanted free higher education</a>. Pensioners <a href="https://apnews.com/article/31ab8e9f5b9a467abdda53616edc72c2">wanted a dignified retirement</a>. Workers <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2019/11/12/chile-workers-unions-strike-in-support-of-ongoing-protests/?gb=true">wanted better wages</a>. Women and feminists <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/06/chile-womens-day-protest">wanted an end to gender violence</a>. </p>
<p>Protesters believe a new constitution with more rights would create stronger mandates for such reforms. The protests paused only during the height of Chile’s pandemic lockdown in spring and early summer. They <a href="https://en.mercopress.com/2020/10/12/rioting-and-protests-continue-in-chile-against-government-and-police-brutality">continue today</a>.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/aB7r6hdo3W4?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Chilean feminists inspired a global trend with ‘El violador eres tú,’ a choreographed protest dance condemning violence against women.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This is not a bloodless movement. Iconic parts of downtown Santiago have been destroyed, two-thirds of the city’s <a href="https://www.bnamericas.com/en/news/santiago-metro-80-stations-damaged-or-destroyed-during-protests">metro stations</a> were damaged and 11 were set ablaze and ruined. Police fired on protesters with rubber bullets, and many of those arrested <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/13/world/americas/chile-police-protests.html">reported extreme brutality</a>, including sexual assault and even torture. Hundreds were wounded and <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20200229190253/https://nacla.org/news/2020/02/24/chile-struggle-democratize-state-plebescite">36 were killed</a> between October 2019 and February 2020. </p>
<p>Violent repression didn’t stop the fury on the streets. A month into the protests, Chile’s congress <a href="https://www.cnnchile.com/pais/toda-oposicion-acuerdo-pide-asamblea-constituyente-plebiscito_20191112/">agreed to hold a referendum</a> on writing a new constitution, and to let voters decide who would draft it.</p>
<h2>Gain and pain</h2>
<p>If, as expected, everyday Chileans write the country’s new constitution, the decision-making power of the political class will be reduced. </p>
<p>Women will also have a greater voice in Chile’s future. <a href="https://www.eldesconcierto.cl/2019/11/27/nueva-constitucion-no-sin-mujeres/">Just two women</a> were among the 12 authors of its Pinochet-era constitution. But feminist leaders and women in congress insisted “<a href="https://www.latercera.com/paula/nunca-mas-sin-nosotras/">never again without women</a>,” demanding that the citizens elected to the constitutional convention be half women.</p>
<p>[<em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>When the <a href="https://www.emol.com/noticias/Nacional/2019/12/21/971123/Paridad-genero-constitucion-como-funciona.html">men in congress balked</a>, the women stood outside the chamber chanting, “we are half, we want half.” </p>
<p>In December 2019 congress conceded. By law, half of the citizens who will write Chile’s new constitution must be women. This establishes a groundbreaking global standard for women’s political inclusion.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A woman in a face mask reading 'Sí apruebo.'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/363285/original/file-20201013-21-p2d0el.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">She’s voting ‘yes’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/woman-poses-with-a-face-mask-reading-i-approve-ahead-of-the-news-photo/1228658444?adppopup=true">Martin Bernetti/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The convention <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/16/world/americas/chile-mapuche-constitution.html">will also reserve seats</a> for Indigenous peoples like the Mapuche, a marginalized group whose ancestral lands <a href="https://www.hrw.org/reports/2004/chile1004/3.htm">have been stolen</a> by the government. </p>
<p>At a time when people worldwide are rising up to demand more equitable and responsive government, from Black Lives Matter in the U.S. to <a href="https://theconversation.com/hong-kong-protesters-dont-identify-as-chinese-amid-anger-at-inequality-survey-suggests-122293">the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong</a>, Chile shows that sustained protests can bring sweeping change. Everyday Chileans, young and old, took exceptional risks to improve their country. Some paid with their lives. </p>
<p>Today, even as Chile’s <a href="https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality">COVID-19 death rates soar</a>, Chileans are still out in the street, protesting inequality and campaigning on the referendum. They want their fellow citizens to vote <a href="https://chiletoday.cl/site/apruebo-campaign-enough-of-partial-reforms/">“yes” on writing a new constitution</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/BrigadistaDign1/status/1315005059646840834">to give the pen to Chile’s people</a> – not its politicians. </p>
<p><em>A <a href="https://theconversation.com/chile-abolishes-its-dictatorship-era-constitution-after-year-of-unrest-148844">newer version of this story</a> was published on Oct. 26, 2020.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/147832/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>On Oct. 25 Chile will decide whether to replace its dictatorship-era constitution with a new one written wholly by the Chilean people. The vote shows how protests can change the course of a nation.Jennifer M. Piscopo, Associate Professor of Politics, Occidental CollegePeter Siavelis, Professor, Department of Political Science and International Affairs, Wake Forest UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/917072018-03-08T11:40:40Z2018-03-08T11:40:40ZFemale presidents don’t always help women while in office, study in Latin America finds<p>When Michelle Bachelet steps down as Chile’s president on March 11, she will bring to a close not just her own administration but also an <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/24/world/americas/michelle-bachelet-president-of-chile.html">era of female leadership in Latin America</a>.</p>
<p>Between 2006 and 2018, four women <a href="https://ecommons.cornell.edu/handle/1813/51646">served as presidents in the region</a>. On the political left, Bachelet and Argentina’s Cristina Fernández both completed two terms. Brazil’s Dilma Rousseff, of the progressive Workers’ Party, was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/31/dilma-rousseff-impeached-president-brazilian-senate-michel-temer">impeached a year into her second administration</a>. And, on the center-right, Laura Chinchilla governed Costa Rica from 2011 to 2014. </p>
<p>For <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=5xSYuXcAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">gender researchers</a> like <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=tIONAuEAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">ourselves</a>, this is a rare chance to assess how the president’s gender influences policy in Latin American countries. Global research has confirmed that having women in the highest echelons of power leads to <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-2508.2006.00402.x/full">greater political engagement among women and girls</a>. We wanted to know what Latin America’s four “presidentas” had done to promote gender equality while in power. </p>
<p>Here’s what <a href="https://academic.oup.com/sp/article-abstract/24/4/345/4775169?redirectedFrom=fulltext">we</a> learned. </p>
<h2>Reproductive rights not guaranteed</h2>
<p>Prior studies had already shown that Latin America’s presidentas <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1548-2456.2016.00316.x/full">nominated more female cabinet ministers</a>, paving the way for future generations of female leaders. </p>
<p>And based on <a href="http://www.schwindt.rice.edu/pdf/publications/reyeshousholder_schwindtbayer2016_book_chapter.pdf">public opinion survey data</a>, we knew that in Latin American countries with female heads of state, women were slightly more likely to participate in local politics than in countries run by men. Latin Americans who have a woman for president are also much less likely than other respondents to say they think men make better political leaders than women.</p>
<p>But <a href="https://academic.oup.com/sp/article-abstract/24/4/345/4775169?redirectedFrom=fulltext">our new research</a> disproves the admittedly tempting idea that merely putting a woman in power improves gender equality. Other factors, including party politics and the presence of strong social movements, turn out to exert more influence on a president’s policies. </p>
<p>Take abortion, for example, which is largely outlawed in <a href="http://www.pewforum.org/2014/11/13/religion-in-latin-america/">heavily Catholic</a> Latin America. Even in the few countries, <a href="https://theconversation.com/incest-case-attests-that-in-costa-rica-abortion-is-legal-in-name-only-75766">like Costa Rica</a>, that allow women to terminate pregnancies resulting from rape, the procedure is still <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-latin-america-is-there-a-link-between-abortion-rights-and-democracy-85444">extremely difficult to obtain</a>. Fully 97 percent of Latin American women <a href="https://www.guttmacher.org/fact-sheet/abortion-latin-america-and-caribbean">cannot get safe, legal abortions</a>, leading to <a href="http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(16)30380-4/abstract">high rates of maternal mortality</a>. </p>
<p>But attempts to ease Latin American abortion laws have historically provoked a deep conservative backlash. In Brazil, Rousseff declared her support for abortion liberalization on the campaign trail in 2010, but <a href="http://vc.bridgew.edu/jiws/vol13/iss3/8/">had to backpedal due to intense media criticism</a>. Once in office, Rousseff remained silent on reproductive rights. </p>
<p>Bachelet also shied away from the issue during her first term. The Catholic opposition was well organized and, at the time, Chile’s feminist movement was relatively weak. Bachelet focused instead on <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/17/world/americas/17chile.html">access to emergency contraception</a>. </p>
<p>By the time she ran for re-election in 2013, however, feminists had <a href="http://lapeste.org/2014/01/autoayuda-practica-el-colectivo-feminista-linea-aborto-libre/">coalesced around abortion reform</a>. They pushed Bachelet to include reproductive rights in her campaign and kept the pressure on once she was in office. In 2017 Chile made abortion <a href="https://academic.oup.com/sp/article/24/4/481/4775171">legal in cases of rape, fetal deformity or danger to a mother’s life</a>.</p>
<p>In Argentina, meanwhile, Fernández – also a leftist – actually <a href="http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_abstract&pid=S1984-64872016000100022&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=es">quashed activists’ efforts</a> to expand reproductive rights. Perhaps unsurprisingly, <a href="https://www.nacion.com/el-pais/chinchilla-opuesta-a-matrimonio-gay-aborto-y-estado-laico/YPC7XHHH6RHGLN6UQXZLNBHBG4/story/">so did the conservative Laura Chinchilla in Costa Rica</a>.</p>
<h2>Gender equality lags under populists</h2>
<p>That’s because major social change requires more than just a woman president. The kind of political party she leads matters a lot – more, in fact, than her gender.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/10/23/populism-is-coming-for-latin-america-in-2018/">left-wing populist parties that ruled Ecuador, Argentina and Venezuela</a> during the period we analyzed made no effort to liberalize abortions. In fact, we found that populist leaders, in their <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-43301423">quest to appeal to the masses</a>, actively shut out feminist activists and ignored the demands of female constituents. </p>
<p>Fernández didn’t just <a href="http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_abstract&pid=S1984-64872016000100022&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=es">uphold Argentina’s harsh abortion restrictions</a> – she actually <a href="http://lasa.international.pitt.edu/LARR/prot/fulltext/vol49no1/49-1_104-127_piscopo.pdf">cut off funding for the country’s universal contraception program</a>, too. Rather than focus on women’s issues, her Justicialist Party expanded social welfare programs, including a hallmark cash-transfer program that <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2011/sep/05/argentina-child-allowance-poor-schools">subsidizes families with young children</a>. </p>
<p>Anti-poverty policies are typical of the <a href="https://www.economist.com/news/americas/21674783-argentinas-dominant-political-brand-defined-power-not-ideology-persistence">populist Peronist movement</a> that brought Fernández and her husband, former president Nestor Kirchner, into power. These initiatives may also help women, since <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2018/02/14/women-poorer-and-hungrier-than-men-across-the-world-u-n-report-says/?utm_term=.f3f426f107c1">they are poorer than men</a>, but that’s not the main goal. </p>
<p>In the Latin American countries we studied, those where reproductive rights most improved in the early 21st century were ruled by what political scientists call “<a href="https://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/content/resurgence-latin-american-left">institutionalized parties</a>.” Such parties generally have a cogent ideology – though it could be left, right or center – a broad base of support and clear structures for responding to constituent demands. </p>
<p>When Bachelet finally loosened abortion restrictions, it was at the helm of a broad-based coalition called the New Majority. Likewise, Uruguay <a href="https://academic.oup.com/sp/article/24/4/481/4775171">fully legalized abortion</a> in 2012 under the presidency of José Mujica and his Broad Front alliance. </p>
<h2>Men help women, too</h2>
<p>Legalizing abortion – one of the world’s most polarizing policy debates – may be asking a lot. So we also assessed whether these four presidentas promoted gender equality in other ways.</p>
<p>We found they did somewhat better on childcare, which <a href="https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/25082/9781464809026.pdf?sequence=6&isAllowed=y">enables women to return to the labor market after becoming mothers</a>. Argentina’s Fernández paid the topic little mind, but <a href="https://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/chile_36227.html">Bachelet</a>, <a href="http://www.loc.gov/law/foreign-news/article/brazil-national-education-plan-approved/">Rousseff</a> and even Costa Rica’s center-rightist <a href="http://www.wradio.com.co/noticias/internacional/laura-chinchilla-firma-ley-para-el-cuidado-de-ninos-y-ancianos/20140324/nota/2143827.aspx">Chinchilla</a> all expanded access to childcare during their tenures. </p>
<p>But <a href="http://www.presidencia.gub.uy/Comunicacion/comunicacionNoticias/vazquez-sistema-de-cuidados-primera-infancia">so did the men who governed Uruguay during the same period</a>. That supports the idea that party type matters more than the chief executive’s gender when it comes to a country’s women’s rights. </p>
<p>And when looking at perhaps the most dramatic improvement in gender equality in Latin American in recent years – the <a href="http://webarchive.ssrc.org/working-papers/CPPF_WomenInPolitics_02_Htun_Piscopo.pdf">high number of women in politics</a> – we see that these changes, too, were led by male and female politicians alike. </p>
<p>Improvements began in the early 1990s. Back then, <a href="https://www.vanderbilt.edu/lapop/pdfs/Schwindt-Bayer_SmallGrant_Publish.pdf">nearly every Latin American country adopted some form of gender quota</a>, which requires political parties to nominate a certain percentage of women for legislative office. In many cases, though, <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1548-2456.2015.00278.x/abstract">the early laws were rather weak</a>. Parties put women on the ballot in districts they could never win or didn’t get fully behind their campaigns.</p>
<p>Over the past decade, women politicians and feminists across the region have <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1548-2456.2015.00278.x/abstract">organized to improve political participation among women</a>. In every country where women <a href="https://academic.oup.com/sp/article/24/4/399/4775165">pushed stronger gender quotas through Congress</a>, those initiatives became law. </p>
<p>The payoff of this popular women’s mobilization has been huge: Between 1990 and 2018, the percentage of <a href="https://jenniferpiscopo.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/piscopo-feb-18-2018.pdf">female lawmakers in Latin America shot up, from 9 percent to 28 percent</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/91707/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>New research on Latin America’s four recent female presidents disproves the idea that merely putting a woman in power will improve gender equality.Merike Blofield, Associate Professor, University of MiamiChristina Ewig, Professor of Public Affairs and Faculty Director of the Center on Women, Gender and Public Policy, Humphrey School of Public Affairs, University of MinnesotaJennifer M. Piscopo, Assistant Professor of Politics, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/784462017-06-21T10:32:02Z2017-06-21T10:32:02ZMarine Le Pen didn’t win over women. Can anyone on the far right?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174575/original/file-20170619-10641-17jj45x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A Le Pen campaign rally in Villepinte, France on May 1, 2017. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">REUTERS/Charles Platiau</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Marine Le Pen has gone from potentially being elected the first female president of France to barely keeping her party alive. </p>
<p>In early May, Le Pen was one of two candidates to advance to the second round of the presidential election. Two months later, her party – the Front National – lost badly in the French parliamentary elections. While Le Pen won her own first-ever parliamentary seat and the FN’s overall share of the 577-seat assembly <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-election-le-pen-idUSKBN1990VK">climbed from to 2 to 8,</a> these gains <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-election-le-pen-idUSKBN1990VK">are still not enough</a> to form an official parliamentary group. </p>
<p>This outcome is surprising given voter enthusiasm for the National Front <a href="http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/802592/french-election-front-national-marine-le-pen-emmanuel-macron-latest">earlier this year</a>. Marine Le Pen cultivated this enthusiasm by attempting to shed the National Front’s anti-Semitic, masculine and staunchly conservative image. She used symbols and policy platforms to give her party’s anti-immigrant and eurosceptic positions a modern veneer. She softened the party’s image by replacing its traditional symbol of a red torch with a <a href="http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2017/04/20/524849419/the-far-rights-marine-le-pen-courts-frances-female-voters">blue flower</a>. She emphasized her role as a mother, one who could disrupt an all-male political terrain. This feminine touch transformed the party her father founded from a fringe movement to a credible contender for the French presidency. </p>
<p>As scholars of <a href="https://jenniferpiscopo.wordpress.com/publications/">women and politics</a> and especially of women <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Right-Women-Republican-Candidates-Legislators/dp/144085162X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1497975756&sr=8-1&keywords=malliga+och">on the right</a>, we are interested in how the National Front and other radical right parties use gender to reach out to female voters. Like other right-wing parties trying to counter their out-of-touch image and broaden their popularity, the FN made two key changes: promoting a women as leader and considering policies that benefit women and other marginalized groups. </p>
<h2>Making populism women- and gay-friendly</h2>
<p><a href="http://press.ecpr.eu/book_details.asp?bookTitleID=102">Right-wing parties feminize</a> to attract new voters, particularly women, because doing so increases their chances of gaining political power. In many advanced industrialized countries, right-wing parties <a href="https://www.hks.harvard.edu/fs/pnorris/Articles/Articles%20published%20in%20journals_files/Developmental_Theory_of_Gender_Gap_Inglehart_Norris_2000.pdf">have fallen out of favor</a> with female voters. These parties are often perceived as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2016/jan/26/rightwing-parties-are-on-the-rise-but-they-wont-win-power-without-women">representing older, white, male voters</a>. <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21700425-europes-far-right-not-such-hit-ladies-lefter-sex">Female voters</a> – especially younger and single women – more frequently gravitate toward the left politically. </p>
<p>Consider these examples of how mainstream conservative parties have tried to woo women. In Germany, conservative Chancellor Angela Merkel has endorsed feminist policies, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/mar/06/germany-gender-quota-legislation-boardroom-law-women">adopting quotas for women on corporate boards</a> and <a href="https://www.eurofound.europa.eu/observatories/eurwork/articles/quality-of-life/germany-family-benefit-rule-changes-encourage-parents-to-share-childcare-duties">reforming parental leave</a> to grant fathers more time off. The U.K.’s Prime Minister <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/politics/is-theresa-may-the-most-feminist-prime-minister-ever/">Theresa May</a>, in her prior role of home secretary, wore a “this is what a feminist looks like” T-shirt and helped strengthen sexual violence laws. And in Japan, conservative Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has pushed <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/shinzo-abe-unleashing-the-power-of-8216womenomics8217-1380149475">“womenomics”</a> – raising the number of women in the workforce by equalizing the pay gap and encouraging businesses to hire more women. </p>
<p>Yet Marine Le Pen stands out for leading the feminization of a radical right-wing party. Such parties are typically populist. They position themselves as bulwarks against social change, mobilizing voters who feel frustrated and abandoned. They oppose immigrants, primarily Muslims, whom they see as threatening Western ways of life. Defending a “pure” national identity – and opposing feminism and liberalism – are central to the right-wing populist project. The unlikelihood of a radical right party feminizing makes Le Pen’s efforts noteworthy.</p>
<p>Under Le Pen’s leadership, the National Front <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/18/front-national-anger-marine-le-pen-female-supporters">no longer proposes to restrict abortion</a> and has softened its approach to LGBTQ issues. It still opposes same-sex marriage, but several LGBTQ individuals <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/lesterfeder/frances-nationalist-party-is-winning-gay-support?utm_term=.wxdbJXJ7DZ#.hmrDA5A419">recently ascended to high-profile positions within the party.</a></p>
<p>Anti-Muslim rhetoric has helped the National Front appeal to both women and LGBTQ voters. During the presidential campaign, Le Pen positioned herself as the protector of French women, their defense against Muslim men who she claims threaten women’s rights and liberties. She evoked iconic French feminist <a href="http://www.lopinion.fr/edition/politique/marine-pen-referendum-sortir-crise-migratoire-94568">Simone de Beauvoir</a> in an op-ed piece, stating <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/18/front-national-anger-marine-le-pen-female-supporters">“I am scared that the migrant crisis signals the beginning of the end of women’s rights.”</a> Likewise, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/39641822/why-gay-french-men-are-voting-far-right">the party alleges</a> that Muslim immigrants hold anti-gay sentiments that endanger the well-being of the LGBTQ community.</p>
<h2>A failed experiment</h2>
<p>Yet feminization did little to improve the electoral fortunes of the Front National. Traditional conservative parties like Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union and May’s Tories have benefited from softening their images. But the Front National’s new modern image did not convince French voters. The French instead handed a resounding <a href="http://www.france24.com/en/20170619-france-elects-record-223-women-parliament-national-assembly-legislative-vote">victory</a> to President Macron’s new centrist party, En Marche (On the Move). A <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-election-women-idUSKBN19911E?il=0">record-high proportion of women</a> were also elected, and women will comprise nearly 50 percent of the En Marche’s parliamentary delegation.</p>
<p>Radical or populist parties face difficulty persuading voters that their commitments to women’s rights and gay rights are sincere, no matter whether women are at the helm or not. The question remains whether populist right parties will double-down on this modernization strategy <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2017/05/08/europe/france-macron-victory-populism-in-europe-analysis/index.html">as the electoral tide turns against them</a>. </p>
<p>Next up in the Western European electoral calendar is Germany, where the ultra-right Alternative for Germany expects to win <a href="http://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/dimap.htm">8 percent</a> of the vote. Women lead this party as well. The top candidates are Alice Weidel and Alexander Gauland, and the party leaders, Frauke Petry and Jorg Meuthen, also form a gender-balanced duo. Weidel has come out as a <a href="http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/the-new-face-of-afd-how-right-wing-is-alice-weidel-a-1146038.html">lesbian</a>. And while she and other LGBTQ party supporters are more concerned about the euro crisis or immigration than sexual identity politics, the presence of women and gay leaders gives these parties an important veneer of modernity. Whether their presence will attract more voters remains to be seen.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/78446/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Populist parties like France’s Front National typically stress traditional family values. So is it possible for them to appeal to traditional leftist voters like single women and the queer community?Malliga Och, Assistant Professor of Global Studies and Languages, Idaho State UniversityJennifer M. Piscopo, Assistant Professor of Politics, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/722552017-03-07T03:14:41Z2017-03-07T03:14:41ZRape on campus: Athletes, status, and the sexual assault crisis<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/159844/original/image-20170307-14934-1hx6k4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Former Vanderbilt football player Brandon Vandenburg was sentenced to 17 years after being convicted in a college rape case.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Mark Humphrey</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The feminist legal scholar <a href="https://www.law.umich.edu/FacultyBio/Pages/FacultyBio.aspx?FacID=camtwo">Catharine MacKinnon</a> once <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674896468">argued</a>
that rape was not prohibited, but merely regulated. She was writing in 1989, four years before it became <a href="https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/publications/abstract.aspx?ID=201457">illegal to rape one’s spouse</a> in all 50 states. At the time, rape was quite clearly regulated in some states: you could rape your spouse, just not anyone else.</p>
<p>MacKinnon, though, wasn’t talking only about the law; she was talking about what happened outside the law, too. She was saying something far more provocative: No matter the law, certain strategies for gaining sexual compliance are sometimes allowed, and certain people can get away with sexual coercion and violence more often and more easily than others.</p>
<p>Learning about such experiences was, unfortunately, an inevitable part of writing <a href="http://books.wwnorton.com/books/American-Hookup/">“American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus,”</a> my book about sex in college. To understand student experiences, I visited 24 institutions, read hundreds of firsthand accounts of hookup culture published in college newspapers, collected 101 student journals about life in the first year and reviewed the now-extensive work on hookup culture by social scientists, which included survey data summarizing 24,000 student responses.</p>
<p>One outcome of this work was an understanding of the role that status plays in organizing sexual activity on campus. Status shapes who has access to sex, with whom and with what consequences. All things being equal, high-status students benefit from hookup culture, while low-status students suffer harm or exclusion.</p>
<p>Among the most high-status students on campus are athletes — especially men who play the most celebrated sports. These students carry the kind of privilege that MacKinnon described, and they often know it. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, a six-time NBA champion, MVP and former UCLA star, once <a href="http://time.com/3689368/campus-sexual-assault-athletes-yes-means-yes/">called out</a> his fellow student-athletes on this issue:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I’m especially aware of the culture of entitlement that some athletes feel, as they strut around campus with the belief that they can do no wrong.“</p>
</blockquote>
<p>On average, athletes are more likely than other students on campus to <a href="http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11199-007-9225-1">identify with hypermasculinity</a> and to <a href="http://knowledge.library.iup.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1407&context=etd">accept</a> <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1077801216651339">"rape myths” </a> to <a href="http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11199-007-9225-1">justify sexual assaults.</a> Evidence also suggests they’re more likely to be <a href="https://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files/McNeil_Consent%20Communication.pdf">confused about consent</a> and admit to having <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1524838014537907">committed</a> <a href="https://news.ncsu.edu/2016/06/attitudes-assault-athletes-2016/">acts</a> of <a href="http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11199-007-9225-1">sexual</a> <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1077801216651339">aggression</a>. </p>
<p>In writing “American Hookup” — in listening carefully to students and documenting how they choose and talk about their sexual partners — I came to understand how high-status athletes are able to persist in holding and acting on these beliefs if they choose to, and with greater impunity than their peers. </p>
<p>Here is what I found.</p>
<h2>Sex and status on college campuses</h2>
<p>In the culture of sex that dominates college campuses today, status is what sex is all about.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158607/original/image-20170227-25959-ajz6cb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158607/original/image-20170227-25959-ajz6cb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=823&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158607/original/image-20170227-25959-ajz6cb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=823&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158607/original/image-20170227-25959-ajz6cb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=823&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158607/original/image-20170227-25959-ajz6cb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1034&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158607/original/image-20170227-25959-ajz6cb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1034&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158607/original/image-20170227-25959-ajz6cb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1034&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Many college football players are adored — almost worshipped — by their peers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Heather Ainsworth</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In some ways, status simply gives athletes sexual access. Students who follow hookup culture’s rules choose to hook up with people they think will enhance their own popularity. As one of the female students who submitted to me a semester-long journal wrote: “It’s almost bragging rights if you hook up with a guy with a higher social status.” </p>
<p>“The whole point,” wrote another in her journal, “is to get some and then be able to point the person out to your friends and be like, ‘Yeah, that guy. That’s right. The hot one over there. I got that.’” </p>
<p>Hookup culture is about “having game”: It’s about “scoring” with someone your peers think is “worth” getting, someone who “counts.” In that game, as one of my male students put it, “sex is a commodity.”</p>
<p>If hookup culture is status-based, then high-status students like athletes are at an advantage. “It automatically sounds better,” explained another one of my female students, to say “I hooked up with a guy on the football team” instead of “I hooked up with a guy.” <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/features/sex-scandal-at-duke-sex-at-duke-duke-university-duke-scandal-duke-fraternities-duke-rape-duke-sororities-20060615">As a female student at Duke</a> put it: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Frat stars and athletes — those are the only ones that matter. I mean, honestly.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Since their star status gives athletes plentiful opportunities to hook up, athletes sometimes find themselves following a hookup script that bears a queasy resemblance to sexual assault. As the students in “American Hookup” reveal, it’s expected in hookup culture that students will get people drunk with the aim of having sex with them; be sexually persistent, even forceful; pull peers into secluded parts of a party; and proceed quickly to sexual intercourse, even when their partners are near incapacitation. </p>
<p>In this way, I found, hookup culture both catalyzes and camouflages sexually coercive behavior: It instigates it at the same time that it makes it invisible. This puts high-status students like athletes at substantial risk of engaging in sexually violent behavior, if only because they have the most opportunity to play out this script. They may also be unlikely to be interrupted when they’re crossing the line.</p>
<h2>Status undermines bystander intervention</h2>
<p>Encouraging and training students to interrupt sexual assaults before they begin — what we call bystander intervention — is one of the <a href="http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/springer/vav/2013/00000028/00000006/art00009">most</a> <a href="http://209.198.129.131/images/Sex%20Violence%20Prevention%20through%20Bystander%20Education.pdf">promising</a> <a href="http://www.kasap.org/images/files/News/evaluation_of_green_dot.pdf">prevention</a> <a href="http://www.ncdsv.org/images/VAW_PreventingSexualAggressionAmongCollegeMenEvalSocialNormsBystanderIntervenPrgrm_2011.pdf">strategies</a>. However, the social power of some athletes may make it harder for peers to interrupt a potential assault when they see one happening. Students are in a social hierarchy and they know it. </p>
<p>Arguably, it’s one thing to pull a drunken peer out of the arms of some guy who lives down the hall; it’s entirely another to do so when he’s one of the most prominent and well-loved students on campus.</p>
<p>When bystanders don’t intervene, it’s left up to victims to come forward and prevent future assaults themselves. But the decision to report is almost always difficult and fraught, which is why <a href="https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/rsavcaf9513.pdf">80 percent of campus sexual assaults go unreported</a>. When students have been victimized by celebrated athletes, how much more bravery is required — especially if the victim doesn’t have equal standing on campus? </p>
<p>Victims <a href="http://time.com/2905637/campus-rape-assault-prosecution/">fear that their anonymity may be compromised</a> and, when it is, they could be subject to <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/US/jameis-winston-rape-accuser-speaks-film/story?id=29268643">the wrath</a> of those who liken athletes to gods.</p>
<h2>Status and institutional protection</h2>
<p>In cases where victims do decide to report the assault, they sometimes discover that their institutions are as inclined to protect the perpetrator as their peers. </p>
<p>Evidence suggests that in some instances, <a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Crisis-of-Campus-Sexual-Violence-Critical-Perspectives-on-Prevention/Wooten-Mitchell/p/book/9781138849419">administrations protect athletes</a> named as perpetrators of sexual assault. A <a href="https://www.mccaskill.senate.gov/SurveyReportwithAppendix.pdf">U.S. Senate survey of 440 colleges and universities</a> found that staff or administrators sometimes discourage victims from reporting, downgrade an assault’s severity, delay proceedings while athletes finish their season or graduate, or simply fail to follow up altogether. When athletes are found responsible for sexual assault, they may suffer only trivial consequences. </p>
<p>In just the last five years, there have been at least 19 controversies surrounding university administrations’ response to reports of sexual assault. For example, despite <a href="http://www.baylor.edu/mediacommunications/news.php?action=story&story=170207">forced changes in leadership</a>, Baylor continues to be embroiled in <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/01/us/texas-rangers-baylor-university/">investigations</a> and <a href="http://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/18846299/judge-allows-lawsuit-baylor-proceed">lawsuits</a>, facing allegations that the university was “deliberately indifferent” to reports of sexual assault involving student-athletes. In January 2016, <a href="http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/18569197/latest-lawsuit-filed-baylor-university-alleges-culture-which-drugs-alcohol-sex-were-encouraged">Florida State settled for $950,000</a> with a former student who alleged that “university officials concealed and obstructed the sexual assault investigation so that [Jameis] Winston could play football.” Though some of the institutions have enacted policies in response to similar allegations, there has been controversy over administrative response to sexual assault at: <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/14/amherst-vanderbilt-sexual-assault_n_4271138.html">Amherst</a>, <a href="http://nypost.com/2013/12/11/co-eds-rip-columbia-over-athlete-rape-probes/">Columbia</a>, <a href="http://jezebel.com/5696455/student-commits-suicide-after-alleged-sexual-assault-by-notre-dame-football-player">Notre Dame</a>, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/14/amherst-vanderbilt-sexual-assault_n_4271138.html">Vanderbilt</a>, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/13/us/how-one-college-handled-a-sexual-assault-complaint.html?_r=0">Hobart and William Smith</a>, <a href="http://jezebel.com/5886537/two-assault-charges-makes-bus-hockey-team-look-pretty-bad">Boston University</a>, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/12/20/outcry-at-loyola-after-students-learn-athlete-accused-of-rape-was-enrolled-for-three-years/?utm_term=.6d8a2e5099db">Loyola University at Chicago</a> and the Universities of <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/21/uconn-sexual-assault-complaint_n_4133713.html">Connecticut</a>, <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2014/01/03/delaware-sued-mishandling-athlete-rape-allegation">Delaware</a>, <a href="http://www.kansascity.com/news/local/article67318452.html">Kansas</a>, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/26/michigan-federal-investigations-sexual-assault_n_4860084.html">Michigan</a>, <a href="http://www.kansascity.com/sports/college/sec/university-of-missouri/article345051/Sasha-Menu-Courey%E2%80%99s-parents-hope-Mizzou-learns-from-investigation.html">Missouri</a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Missoula-Rape-Justice-System-College/dp/0804170568">Montana</a>, <a href="http://deadspin.com/lawsuit-unm-interfered-with-gang-rape-case-involving-f-1687067387">New Mexico</a>, <a href="http://wivb.com/2015/12/07/niagara-university-dean-of-students-placed-on-leave-as-investigation-begins/">Niagara</a>, <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/bdavidridpath/2016/09/15/the-attitude-toward-sexual-and-athlete-violence-in-college-sports-must-change/#125b7503451d">North Carolina</a>, <a href="http://www.thecollegianur.com/article/2016/09/richmond-student-speaks-about-title-ix-case">Richmond</a>, <a href="http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2016/02/09/sweeping-sexual-assault-suit-filed-against-ut/79966450/">Tennessee</a> and <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaab/2014/08/21/patrick-swilling-jr-letter-tulsa-idaho-sexual-assault-title-ix/14394481/">Tulsa</a>.</p>
<p>I would also argue that many colleges and universities have a problem in the form of a perverse incentive: Because of the relationship between higher education and sports, protecting student-athletes — especially in high profile sports — can be <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/education/edlife/how-big-time-sports-ate-college-life.html">akin to protecting the institution itself</a>. </p>
<h2>The status quo</h2>
<p>Catharine MacKinnon’s comments, almost 30 years later, still have the ring of truth. Certain people can get away with sexual coercion and violence more often and more easily than others. On college campuses, hookup culture is part of why. </p>
<p>Intervening as a bystander is <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0886260513505210">difficult enough already</a>, but my research has shown that students are even less inclined to do so when it means confronting someone with substantially more social power. And when men and women are assaulted by high-profile athletes or other high-status students, they may fear that reporting will bring further suffering — this time at the hands of their peers and their institutions.</p>
<p>There are things we can do. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.mccaskill.senate.gov/SurveyReportwithAppendix.pdf">report submitted to the US Senate</a> showed that many colleges and universities aren’t currently in compliance with the law and fail to follow the best known practices for prevention, reporting and adjudication. </p>
<p>Institutions need to follow those practices consistently, even — and this is the hard part — when it harms their reputation or bottom line. </p>
<p>Of course, I expect there will still be the perverse incentives faced by administrators tasked with protecting both students and the institutions they represent, as well as the devotion students have to their schools’ star athletes. To my mind, colleges need to institutionalize <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/education/edlife/how-big-time-sports-ate-college-life.html">a different relationship between higher education and sports</a>. In other words, to make real inroads against sexual assault on campus, the status that both athletics and athletes enjoy should be reduced.</p>
<p>More broadly, in my view, students need to be enabled to question whether sex should be about status at all. Must casual sex be an inherently competitive game with winners and losers? Or, could partners be chosen for their generosity or a shared affinity? Students could place a premium on pleasure and personal growth instead of popularity. Until they change their minds about the role sex plays on campus, sexual misconduct will continue to be more regulated than prohibited.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/72255/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lisa Wade is the author of "American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus," published by WW Norton & Co.</span></em></p>Why are student-athletes so often at the center of sexual assault cases? A look at the culture of hookups, coverups, and who’s got game.Lisa Wade, Professor of Sociology, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/711472017-01-17T04:33:12Z2017-01-17T04:33:12ZIs mass murder becoming a form of protest?<p>If there’s one thing Americans can agree upon, it might be that people – no matter how angry they are – shouldn’t be indiscriminately firing guns into crowds. Yet mass shootings are <a href="https://thesocietypages.org/feminist/2015/07/23/masculinity-and-mass-shootings/">on the rise</a>, with <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/US/fort-lauderdale-airport-shooting-suspect-esteban-santiago-due/story?id=44648911">the shooting at the Fort Lauderdale airport</a> just the latest example. </p>
<p>I’m fearful that what we’re seeing isn’t just an increase in violence but the normalization of a habit, a new behavior recognized as a way to express an objection to the way things are. That is, I’m afraid that mass murder may be becoming – to the horror of almost all of us, but to the liking of a violent few – a form of protest.</p>
<h2>The evolution of protest</h2>
<p>To register an objection to something about the world, a person or group needs to engage in an action that other people recognize as a form of protest. </p>
<p>In other words, we know what protest looks like. </p>
<p>It’s a strike, a rally, a march, a sit-in, a boycott. These are all recognizable ways in which individuals and groups can stake a political claim, whereas other group activities – a picnic, a group bike ride, singing together – are not obviously so. To describe this set of protest-related tools, the sociologist Charles Tilly coined the phrase “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repertoire_of_contention">repertoire of contention</a>.” Activists have a stock of actions to draw from when they want to make a statement that others will understand.</p>
<p>A culture’s repertoire of contention constantly evolves. Each tool has to be invented – and conceptually linked to the idea of protest – before it can play that role. The sit-in, for example, was <a href="http://www.ushistory.org/us/54d.asp">invented during the early civil rights movement</a>. When African-American activists and their allies occupied white-only restaurants, bringing lunch counters to a halt to bring attention to the exclusion of black people, they introduced a new way of objecting to the status quo, one that almost anyone would recognize today.</p>
<p>New ways of protesting are being invented every day: The hashtag, the hacktivist and shutting down freeways are newer forms. Some become permanent parts of the repertoire. Consider the <a href="http://users.ox.ac.uk/%7Esfos0060/repertoire.shtml">graph</a> put together by sociologist <a href="http://users.ox.ac.uk/%7Esfos0060/index.html">Michael Biggs</a>, which shows how suicide as a form of protest caught on in the 1960s.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/152336/original/image-20170110-29031-u4pd13.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/152336/original/image-20170110-29031-u4pd13.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/152336/original/image-20170110-29031-u4pd13.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/152336/original/image-20170110-29031-u4pd13.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/152336/original/image-20170110-29031-u4pd13.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/152336/original/image-20170110-29031-u4pd13.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/152336/original/image-20170110-29031-u4pd13.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/152336/original/image-20170110-29031-u4pd13.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Beginning in the 1960s, suicides started to become a widely recognized – and used – form of protest.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://users.ox.ac.uk/~sfos0060/images/suicide_protest_graph.jpg">Michael Biggs</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Arguably, extrajudicial murder of African-Americans and their white sympathizers – a form of murder known as “lynching” – was a form of protest <a href="http://uncpress.unc.edu/books/12845.html">during and after the US Civil War</a>. These were highly political acts, a form of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/11/opinion/lynching-as-racial-terrorism.html">domestic terrorism</a>. Lynchings were intended as warnings to people who supported abolition, emancipation, and equal rights for African-Americans. It was murder as a form of protest.</p>
<p>Lynchings continued until the 1960s, by which time most (except, perhaps, the most radical of white supremacists) no longer saw them as a legitimate type of resistance to civil rights.</p>
<h2>Mass murder as resistance?</h2>
<p>The examples above show how the repertoire of contention evolves. Could mass shootings join the repertoire next? </p>
<p>It certainly seems as if mass murder with a gun is a more familiar and more easily conceptualized way of expressing one’s discontent than it was, say, <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/high-school-bloodbathgun-toting-teens-kill-25-article-1.822951">pre-Columbine</a>. If a person is outraged by some state of affairs, mass killing is a readily available way to express that outrage both technically (thanks to gun regulation) and cognitively (because it is now part of the recognized repertoire).</p>
<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dylann_Roof">Dylann Roof</a> wanted to register his discontent with the place of black people in American society, abortion opponent <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_Springs_Planned_Parenthood_shooting">Robert Lewis Dear</a> stormed a Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Orlando_nightclub_shooting">Omar Matteen</a> likely killed dozens to express his (internalized) disgust for homosexuality, and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_shooting_of_Baton_Rouge_police_officers">Gavin Long</a> communicated his sense of rage and helplessness in the face of black deaths by killing police. </p>
<p>We may never know why some resort to violence. But in at least some cases it’s to make a point. At some point each of the aforementioned men thought, “What can I do to get my point across?” And mass murder came to mind.</p>
<p>In the aftermath of such events, the news media routine contributes to the idea that mass murder is a form of protest by searching for an explanation above and beyond the desire to kill. That explanation often positions the rationale for the murder within the realm of politics, whether we call it terrorism, resistance or prejudice. This further sends the message that mass murder is political, part of the American repertoire of contention.</p>
<p>The terrifying part is that once protest tools become part of the repertoire, they are diffused across movements and throughout society. It’s no longer just civil rights activists who use the sit-in; any and all activists do. Perhaps that’s why we see such a range of motivations among these mass murderers. It has become an obvious way to express an objection, and the discontented know they can get their point across.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/71147/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lisa Wade does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>New ways of expressing discontent are constantly emerging. Could mass shootings join what sociologist Charles Tilly has dubbed the ‘repertoire of contention’?Lisa Wade, Professor of Sociology, Occidental CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.