Divided Environment: The Splitting of Workplace and Environmental Regulation

Let’s say that poison gas leaks from a plant, sickening workers and residents. Should OSHA investigate, or the EPA? Who is responsible when both agencies have a claim to jurisdiction? The American federal government regulates the workplace and the environment separately, despite their material inseparability, that the workplace is part of the environment. How and why did the American regulatory landscape come to have this awkward and contradictory split?

Jasper Cattell, PhD candidate at Brown University, formulated this novel question and seeks an answer in his dissertation project. Cattell conducted research in the archives of labor organizations, environmental groups, federal agencies, and the business community. To get at the latter, Cattell visited the Hagley Library to examine the archives of the National Association of Manufacturers, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and other private business organizations. The messily drawn boundary between workplace and environmental regulation served the interest of the various outside groups who could play one agency against the other to gain favorable outcomes.

In support of his work Cattell received funding from the Center for the History of Business, Technology, and Society at the Hagley Museum and Library. For more information, and more Hagley History Hangouts, visit us online at hagley.org.

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