Community-based campaigns to advance from science to policy

Abstract

Community-based campaigns are an effective tool to translate environmental health research to policy. Campaigns that are evidence-based can influence media, policymakers and provide credibility for community residents and advocates who can tell their story founded on their experience, community expertise and knowledge, and sound research. Organizing residents most affected by an environmental exposure to speak for themselves is compelling to elected officials and policymakers who often need mobilized communities to build the political will to assert their agency against experienced, well paid lobbyists. It is an important means of securing policies and practice that improves the environmental health of all especially the most vulnerable populations. Translation of research to policy is an important role for community partners engaged in community-academic partnerships. That role ensures that the research does not remain in peer-reviewed journals but is put into practice and policy. Methods include community organizing; training of residents to understand the data and to articulate their experience; strong interaction and collaboration between academics, community partners, advocates and community residents; and briefings for elected officials, policymakers, and media. Decades of community-academic partnership in Harlem and the South Bronx has yielded positive legislation and practice change on toxics, air pollutants, pesticides, and carbon reduction. Community-based campaigns can be effective and transformative with strong advocacy and organizing, and with academics who understand the value of their research being translated and guided -- by the people most affected-- into outcomes that improve health and knowledge at the grassroots and at the city, state and federal levels.