This article outlines a conceptual model and comparatively applies it to results from environmental justice (EJ) studies of flood risk in the Miami, Florida, and Houston, Texas, metropolitan areas. In contrast to most EJ studies of air pollution, which have found that socially vulnerable groups experience disproportionate risk, distributive EJ studies of flooding reveal inconsistent findings regarding the relationship between social vulnerability and flood exposure. Counterintuitively (from a conventional EJ perspective), some pre-flood EJ studies have found that socially advantaged people experience the highest residential exposure to flood risks. To integrate those anomalous findings within an EJ perspective, our conceptual model focuses on (1) the differential capacities of social groups to deploy/access protective resources for reducing the threat of loss, even while they reside amid flood-prone environments, and (2) both flood hazards and water-based benefits. Application of this model in Miami reveals that environmental injustices materialize as socially privileged groups expose themselves to residential flood risks by seeking coastal amenities, as the costs of mitigating risks are conveyed to the broader public; in the process, socially vulnerable residents are relegated to areas with air pollution and/or inland flood risks, where they experience constrained access to protective resources and coastal amenities. Findings from Houston better align with conventional EJ expectations—with flood zones disproportionately inhabited by socially vulnerable people—because many coastal lands there are used by petrochemical industries, which produce major residential-environmental disamenities. Results underscore the need to consider protective resources and locational benefits in future empirical research on the EJ implications of flood hazards.

中文翻译：

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环境不公和洪水风险：迈阿密市区和美国休斯顿的概念模型和案例比较。

本文概述了一个概念模型，并将其比较地应用于环境正义（EJ）研究中的佛罗里达州迈阿密市和德克萨斯州休斯顿市都会区的洪水风险。与大多数空气污染的EJ研究相反，这些研究发现社会弱势群体面临的风险不成比例，而分布式EJ研究表明，关于社会脆弱性和洪水暴露之间关系的研究结果不一致。违反直觉（从传统的EJ角度来看），一些洪灾前的EJ研究发现，处于社会有利地位的人在住宅中遭受洪水风险的风险最高。为了将这些异常发现整合到EJ视角中，我们的概念模型着重于（1）社会团体在减少/遭受损失的威胁时，即使他们处于易生洪水环境中，也能够部署/访问保护资源的能力有所差异；以及（2）洪水灾害和水利。该模型在迈阿密的应用表明，由于社会特权群体通过寻求沿海便利设施而承受住区洪水风险，因此环境不公正现象日益严重，因为减轻风险的成本已传达给广大公众。在此过程中，社会弱势居民被降级到空气污染和/或内陆洪水风险高的地区，在那里他们获得保护资源和沿海设施的机会有限。残障人士。结果强调了在未来的洪水灾害EJ含义的实证研究中需要考虑保护性资源和区位收益。