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Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the political contest over "environmental colonialism," the petrochemical industry, and political dependence that emerged around a controversial petroleum "superport" proposal in Puerto Rico in 1974.

Paper long abstract:

By the early 1970s, the petrochemical industry had already reshaped Puerto Rico's environment. "What is an island?" the magazine "Claridad" asked. "An island is a portion of cement surrounded on all sides by contaminated water. Puerto Rico is an island," it responded. In 1974, the tensions between economic and environmental priorities heightened around a controversial petroleum "superport" proposed for Puerto Rico's southern shore. Advanced by local politicians, mainland corporate concerns, and the US federal government, the superport sparked a mass movement in Puerto Rico to oppose its creation. Protestors reevaluated the environmental track-record of existing petrochemical industries and opposed the superport on ecological grounds. At the same time, opponents developed a critical analytic framework to describe the uneven distribution of environmental costs onto colonial territories by mainland petroleum companies. Anti-colonial nationalists in particular wielded charges of "environmental colonialism" to challenge the ongoing transformation of Puerto Rican landscapes by the expanding petroleum industry.

This paper explores the convergence of anti-colonial nationalism and environmental activism catalyzed by the Puerto Rican superport complex. It examines how histories of environmental degradation and colonial subordination informed a mass movement against the superport during the mid-1970s. At the same time, it considers how the Puerto Rican example fits into a larger historiography on environmentalism and environmental justice that has paid only scant attention to environmental movements across the archipelagic geography of US overseas empire.