A quantitative systematic review of distributive environmental justice literature: a rich history and the need for an enterprising future

Environmental distributive justice contextually assesses social equities in relation to natural resources. While there is a rich literature on environmental distributive justice, there have been few assessments quantifying the biases and scopes of this literature. We conduct a systematic review of the literature. We find several key biases and summarize the breadth of subjects that have been studied or discussed. We find a very distinct overlap between authorship nationality and study location, which is concerning, as some of the world’s most polluted and inequitable societies are least represented in authorship. Additionally, we find a dominance of quantitative studies. These results are important for understanding both where future research efforts in this area could best be directed, and how the literature could be enriched by diversified approaches. Improving environmental justice studies is critical and important for many people across our global society, which is increasingly shaped by widespread natural resource depletion.