Environmental Joy Conference Focuses on Resilience in the Face of Challenges Ahead

Grace Gibson-Synder ’26 was one of a group of 16 young plaintiffs who sued the state of Montana for violating their rights to a clean and healthful environment. They won.

Helena Gualinga worked with Indigenous activists in Ecuador on a referendum to restrict oil extraction in Yasuní National Park in the Amazon, one of the most biodiverse ecosystems in the world. They won.

Richard Moore and Peggy Shepard spent decades fighting for environmental and economic justice. In 2021, they became co-chairs of the White House Environmental Justice Advisory Council, overseeing far-reaching federal efforts to address current and historic environmental injustice.

During the Environmental Joy conference held at the Yale School of the Environment on November 8-9, they each recounted how, at times, they despaired that victory was unattainable. It wasn’t — and that’s the message they wanted to convey. Never give up, they said.

“So many people said your fight (to prevent oil drilling in the park) is impossible. But we won an incredible court case. I’m not saying everything is set now. This is going to be a long struggle,” said Gualinga, who is a member of the Indigenous Kichwa community of Sarayaku in the Andes in Ecuador.  “But (our victory) instills hope in me. It really shows what happens when people work together.”

This year’s Environmental Joy conference, hosted by the Yale Center for Environmental Justice (YCEJ), focused on resistance, resilience, and hope. The conference drew more than 200 environmentalists and climate leaders, many of whom took the opportunity to consult with panelists from NGOs, government, and community groups on how to forge pathways to continue their work.

“Environmental Joy this year was an inter-generational ‘congress’… a coming together of leadership from environmental justice communities, young and old, to formulate the opportunities, the directions and the actions we most need in the coming years,” said Michel Gelobter, executive director of YCEJ.

Here are key takeaways from the conference:

Collaboration is a must

In the opening plenary session, “Where do we go from here,” Peggy Shepard and Richard Moore, who helped devised the 17 “Principals of Environmental Justice” at the First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit held in 1991, recounted their half-century of activism. The duo recalled seminal events in the movement, such as the 1968 Poor People’s Campaign and March on Washington and spoke about how their work continued through multiple administrations.

They counseled community groups to work together — even if it means putting aside differences on some issues and competition for funding — and across generational divides.

“For those of us that went through the military repression, the police repression, systemic racism, sexism, and homophobia … do not let anyone pit us against each other.  We will stand beside each other in this struggle. We need to do this together,” said Moore, who is also co-coordinator of Los Jardines Institute.

Shepard, who is executive director of We Act for Environmental Justice, talked about her work with the Equitable & Just National Climate Platform that includes more than a dozen organizations promoting shared goals centered on economic, racial, climate and environmental justice.

“What do we do now? … To really push back, we’ve got to come together with resources and skills. That’s where the joy comes from. The joy comes in resistance, knowing that we can develop campaigns and initiatives so that our communities will not be further harmed. I believe we have a lot of opportunities,” she said.

Climate work extends beyond election years

Justin Pearson, a state representative from Tennessee who was temporarily expelled in 2023 from the state legislature for supporting a youth protest on gun control following a mass shooting in Nashville, said the work for a sustainable future will move forward despite the political climate.

During the panel “The fire right now,” Pearson declared that an election setback does not mean defeat and the future relies on the continuation of justice work.

“We are still here, which means that we have the capacity, the opportunity, the obligation, to do something,” he said.

Gibson-Synder said the environmental movement is expanding beyond politics.

“I think there is some natural momentum to all these battles,” she said during a session on bridging the political divide. “Progress has been made. I think we can build a broader environmental movement that bridges the partisan divide and depoliticizes it. There’s a lot of room for common ground.”

Local communities are the experts

Newsletter

Subscribe to “YSE 3”

Biweekly, we highlight three news and research stories about the work we’re doing at Yale School of the Environment.

During a session on building trusted partnerships, Denae King, associate director of the Bullard Center for Environmental and Climate Justice noted the importance of community knowledge and neighborhood-based action.

While the research and data that academic institutions provide are crucial to moving environmental justice issues forward, the communities most affected that have been taking action, need to be at the center of guiding strategy, the panelists noted throughout the conference.

“Communities have the solutions; communities have adequate plans already in place that we need to support,” King said.

Communities must tell their own histories and lead in decision-making affecting their neighborhoods, Moore emphasized.

“To move forward, let us speak for ourselves,” he said. “We need to be on the inside as much as we are on the outside.”

Daniel Morgan ’25 MEM contributed to this story.