MOVEing Beyond Anti-State to Anti-Civ: Black Lives Matter and the MOVE Organization Through the Critical Environmental Justice Lens

Abstract

This article examines the radical ecological philosophy developed by the MOVE organization in the early 1970s and the purchase it may have for the contemporary Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. Using archival data comprising primary documents collected for the Philadelphia Special Investigation Commission, I demonstrate that MOVE's philosophical principles correspond well with the critical environmental justice (CEJ) framework advanced by sociologist David Pellow (2016, 2018) to address theoretical gaps in the mainstream environmental justice movement. Illustrating the potential of CEJ, Pellow uses BLM as a case to analyze the ways this movement exemplifies key pillars of CEJ, but falls short in others. Specifically, Pellow demonstrates that BLM expands intersectional analyses beyond race and class and links newer forms of state-sanctioned violence against black people in the United States to a larger historical narrative, but also upholds the racial discourse of animality, fails to recognize species as a key category of difference, and legitimates the state by employing tactics that take the state for granted. Building upon this work, I ultimately argue that thoughtful engagement with some of MOVE's core beliefs can help BLM develop a strategic approach that (1) recognizes the interconnectedness between the oppression of African-descended peoples and the nonhuman world, (2) transcends the state in an attempt to resolve the problem of state-sanctioned violence against marginalized groups, and (3) brings the movement closer to a theoretical perspective that is in greater alignment with the goal of black liberation.