Values matter

Abstract

Environmental impact assessments (EIAs) have become an important process through which the environment is formally valued. Underpinning values play a large role in determining monetary and symbolic worth. These hinge upon dominant scientific narratives; thus, experiential community knowledge tends to be disregarded. When this happens, community members, particularly women, are excluded from formal environmental decision processes, prompting their mobilization. Forces of exclusion and mobilization are evident in the case study presented in this chapter, which involves an EIA of a major cement factory proposed by the conglomerate Nirma Ltd. for a rural area of the Mahuva taluka (block) of Gujarat, India. The case study reveals that the underpinning values and normative assumptions of the current EIA process in India need to change to allow comprehensive assessments and authentic community engagement. However, it also suggests that EIAs could play an important role in achieving environmental justice when implemented and used intersectionally. Shifting the value system behind EIAs so they incorporate a variety of perspectives, knowledge and understandings would help ensure that local experiences and diversity are authentically included. A promising tool for enabling this shift in values is gender-based analysis, which is increasingly being used in EIAs worldwide.