Who We Are - The Margin

The Margin is an independent media platform that centers the people and places most affected by environmental injustice in the United States. Our stories expose the ongoing cycle of unjust actions that intentionally push the poor and people of color to the edge of society while driving our planet to the brink of collapse.

Founding Story

The Margin was founded to center the hidden stories of the environmental justice movement; a movement that began 40 years ago in Warren County, North Carolina. 

To fully understand what we do at The Margin, a brief history of environmental justice is helpful. This work is possible thanks to the activists, organizers, and journalists whose shoulders we stand on:

Changemakers like the more than 500 residents of Warren County who were arrested for protesting a new hazardous waste landfill. Though toxic waste was ultimately deposited in the landfill, that moment sparked a movement that we strive to advance today.

Trailblazers like the 300 Black, Brown, Indigenous, and AAPI folks who gathered at the First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit, held in Washington, D.C., in 1991 to redefine environmental issues in their own terms. Through consensus-building, they drafted the principles of environmental justice.

In the stories we produce, we see those who have been and are currently experiencing injustice. We see Warren County and Washington D.C., “Bloody Lowndes” and “Cancer Alley.” We see the communities where we live and many more that have been intentionally erased, exploited, and marginalized.

Our Approach

We are by, about, and for the voices and communities that endure environmental injustice. And we believe data reinforces and strengthens voices. For this reason, every story in The Margin combines personal narratives with data analysis and visualizations.

By pairing in-depth reporting with data, we aim to immerse readers in the issues, to look back historically and see how the landscape has changed, to understand where we are now, how we got here, and where we go next.