Justice as Measure of Nongovernmental Organization Success in Postdisaster Community Assistance

Bibliographic Data

ID5337627
AuthorsBarbara L Allen (0000-0001-8200-2066, Virginia Tech, Washington, DC, USA, corresponding author)
Year2013
Volume38
Issue2
Pages224-249
Publication date2013-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueScience Technology & Human Values (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0162-2439 • E-ISSN: 1552-8251
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0162243912470726
OpenAlexW2162060074
LanguageEN
Citations received8
References cited24

Through exploring multiple contemporary conceptions of justice, this article illustrates that justice matters when considering outcomes in nongovernmental organization (NGO) assistance. In environmental justice (EJ) scholarship, the term justice has been underproblematized, assuming a tacit understanding of the concept as fairness or equitable distribution of environmental harms. Using the rebuilding of two heavily damaged poor and minority neighborhoods in post-Katrina New Orleans as case studies, this article makes evident the different conceptualizations of justice embedded within the strategies and techniques of NGOs and community organizations. Examining both practices and outcomes, I argue that the definition of justice that NGOs implicitly or explicitly adopt in their strategies and technologies of assistance can lead to very different results in postdisaster neighborhood revitalization. For science and technology studies, conceptions of justice can help articulate a more critical social science that opens up the descriptive/normative divide. This is important in thinking about equitable social change and allied policy-as it applies not only to NGO assistance but also to other science and technology issues that intersect with marginalized communities as well

Economic Justice · Environmental ethics · Environmental justice · Normative · Political science · Public relations · Scholarship · Sociology · Environmental Justice and Health Disparities · Law · Risk Perception and Management · Water Governance and Infrastructure