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Volume 2 Number Supplement 1
  • ISSN: 2632-2463
  • E-ISSN: 2632-2471
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Abstract

This article examines the environmental impacts of the US military presence in Hawaiʻi, looking specifically at the federal government’s power to condemn land for a ‘public purpose’ under the US Constitution. In 2018, the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court ruled that the State of Hawaiʻi failed its duty to properly manage 23,000 acres of lands leased to the military at Pōhakuloa and must take an active role in preserving trust property. With the expiration of this lease (and several others) approaching in 2029, controversy is stirring as to whether the military will simply condemn these lands if the cost of clean-up is greater than the land’s fair-market value at the expiration of the lease. In other words, as long as it remains cheaper for the military to pollute and condemn than it is for it to restore, what options do we have for legal and political recourse? Considering grassroots movements’ strategic use of media and legal action through an environmental justice lens, this article provides a starting point to consider avenues for ensuring proper clean-up of these lands, and ultimately, negotiating for their return to Kānaka Maoli.

© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Intellect Ltd
This article is Open Access under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-ND), which allows users to copy, distribute and transmit the article as long as the author is attributed, the article is not used for commercial purposes, and the work is not modified or adapted in any way. To view a copy of the licence, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
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2021-11-02
2024-04-25
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http://instance.metastore.ingenta.com/content/journals/10.1386/jem_00051_1
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  • Article Type: Article
Keyword(s): colonialism; environmental justice; environmental law; Indigenous land; militarization; restorative justice; slow violence

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