Taking Action, Saving Lives - Part 3 (Practical Application)

I am not the biggest fan of complex theories but I do love putting what I learn into practice. This just happened today to me. My cell phone screen died on me. Because I have no way of finding my contacts or making any calls, I would have to get rid of the phone.

We've been talking about this all semester - about disposing of waste properly. The first thought that came to mind when I actually realized I had to throw my phone away was that I had to now put what I learnt in class to practice in real life. Sure, it was easier to just talk about stuff in class but it is a different thing to actually do what you learnt in class.

I suppose I would be recycling the phone through one of the companies listed on the BAN website but that would first involve contacting them about it because there are none in Des Moines. I was thinking about recycling my phone through the little plastic baggies that they have at all the dorms but thought twice about it because I have no idea where its going to go.

Another option would be to sell my old, broken phone on eBay for parts. But then again, it will not fetch much and the non-reusable parts would eventually be thrown away (reponsibly or not...) by the person who bought it from me.

So instead of doing the convenient thing, I will do the inconvenient but right thing which is to recycle it properly. It will only happen after finals are done because my current schedule will not allow it. The question that came to mind while all of this happened was that, are others just as willing to be inconvenienced in order to do the right thing?

I know I will not have a clear conscience if I just toss out the phone into the trash but the only reason as to why I feel this way is because I have learnt about it. What about people who have not learnt about this, or maybe have only vaguely heard about environmental injustice? What would those people then do? I shudder to think of the consequences.

I had a conversation last Tuesday with a friend who is a business major about environmental justice issues and in the beginning, he did not see anything wrong with the way "recycling" is done in developing countries. I even told him about Guiyu and he casually said that as long as they're willing to work for the money, why not? I quoted Jim Puckett from the Basel Action Network; people shouldn't have to choose between poverty or poison. He eventually acknowledged that there was a lot of ethics involved.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that a lot of the time, people get so caught up in the nitty gritty details that they fail to distinguish what is clearly wrong or right. It is an unfair decision to let a poor farmer choose between dying now of starvation or dying 20 years from now of cancer.

I know my small contribution to fighting the e-waste trade will not make much of a difference but I do know that if a lot of people feel the same way, things would definitely change. I liked SF's idea of not actually targeting the big problems first because you know it will not work for now. She suggests starting small, going local and for Des Moines, the best thing we can do to help the fight for environmental justice is to recruit a local recycling company who is willing to join the Basel Action Network (BAN) campaign for ethical recyclers.

Although we might not have curbed the production of electronics, we can at least ensure that none of it will end up in places like Guiyu.

Taking Action, Saving Lives (Part 2 - Inequality)

I find this book a lot more readable than the previous SF book but I guess this book is geared towards a different audience. SF talks mainly about science and the conflict of private interest science with public interest in the 3rd chapter of the book. I was in class on Monday and I thought I overheard someone say that she seems to be giving scientists a hard time. I agree somewhat with that but then again, she does give credit to those who actually do the right thing - like Warheim and Finkel (in Chapter 5). All of her arguments make sense; they really do. We should be moral citizens and uphold justice and equality etc etc. but unless a really dramatic chain of events occur, I don't think it is possible just because of the way the economy and society is set up at the moment.

I've always thought that Americans had a pretty good standard of living but finding out that it is much lower than 41 other developed countries is rather shocking. The horrible part about reading such a thing is that the information that SF produces to explain such a phenomenon is actually logical and makes a whole lot of sense. The US usually has so much clout in world affairs but then again, is this country fit to be in such a position?

I know this class is targeting environmental injustices but I think the biggest barrier to this issue is the way the US economy works. I am no business major but I think I can see how why things are the way they are in American society. Lets not talk about ethics and what not right now but focus on economics.

The US economy to me seems closer to the ideal "free-trade" economy compared to many other countries and this is probably the root of the problem. In an unregulated economy, corporations are geared to maximizing their profits with as little inputs (costs) as possible and the same goes for people who are part of this economy. Because there is fierce competition, people want to get more bang for their buck...making their money go a long way.

Inqualities like low pay (even with regulation) is market dynamics at work. Which company in a "free-market" economy would want to pay Worker A $10 an hour when Worker B is willing to work for $5 an hour? There is a constant demand for cheap labor not only in this country but in the world to cut down costs and maximize profits. Immigrant workers who earn much less if they work back home are willing to accept what is considered a low pay over here but is still much more than what they would earn back home.

This is why the rich keep getting richer and the gap between the rich and poor keeps increasing. To address this issue of economics, we cannot just foster change in the US but it has to be worldwide. If a US company is unable to meet their target spending over here because of high costs, they will most likely outsource their work to countries with cheap labor such as China. We worry about the environmental injustices that American workers face but what about the workers in the developing world?

We constantly want cheap goods to make the most of our money. Consumerism is probably the result of large scale advertising by corporations to purchase their products. The whole system is run by the amount of profits one makes. As a corporation, the more they sell, the more they earn. As consumers, the more we get for our money, the more satisfied we are. Logically, why would we want to change the way this system works because consumers and corporations technically benefit from such an arrangement.

Lets bring ethics into the picture now. According to SF and many other philosophers, we have a moral obligation to do the right thing. Especially since we are part of a demoncracy because the outcomes are due to the choices that we make. We owe it to other human beings to be treated as well as we are just because they're people too. I think everyone will agree with that but when it comes to how the economy and society is so intertwined, it it hard to put it into practice.

Private-interest science is no different; people get paid to do their job. People want to better their lives and they just so happen to be scientists but then, scientists have an ethical responsibility to report the truth. But they're people too, with wants that may not be fulfilled if they chose to report the truth. Could you really blame them for doing the wrong thing? I find it hard to point a finger because if I were put in such a position; with losing my job and being labelled a junk scientist, it would be tough to make a choice.

I think most people, if they really thought about it, do know what is going on. SF's book is a reminder as to why we should do the right thing. We all know what the right thing is but the main issue I feel, is to take a step into doing the right thing. Are we willing to sacrifice our money, time and standard of living to ensure that justice is being practiced everywhere?

Taking Action, Saving Lives (Part 1)

This book is written in such a way that it is easier for one to digest the information compared to SF previous book that we read for the class. The book started off by talking about ethical responsibility and democratic responsibility. Democratic responsibility requires citizens to acknowledge that they cause indirect harm to others and they have the responsibility to stop or change the current system. Ethical responsibility requires citizens to acknowledge that they benefit from such harm and as a consequence, they have a responsibility to stop such practices.

She highlights the different risks caused by pollution, the most common being cancer with minorities, poor communities and children being the most susceptible to such risks. Although there seems to be overall progress in the health and safety in developed countries such as the United States, environmental conditions have not improved but have gotten worse. Health care has gotten more expensive but does not seem as effective in increasing the longevity of people in the US. Relatively speaking, other countries seem to have better environmental standards, cheaper health care and longer lifespans compared to the US.

One f the main reasons for lax environmental regulation in the US is the fact that research can no longer be trusted as many corporations fund research done by institutions of higher learning. As a result of having vested interests, university research have been suppressed and modified to suit the requirements of the funding corporations which is not only illegal but unfair. It is our right to ask about such things and to do what is right but it may mean risking one's life such as Karen Silkwood did. Corporations understand how the system works and are willing to spend large amounts of money to gain an even bigger return on their investments. They have so much at stake and will go all out to ensure that it will not be taken away from them.

That's why PR companies, lawyers and lobbyists are making so much money because corporations have almost seemingly unlimited resources to fund their own interests. Although the US may have many state and federal departments such as the EPA to deal with environmental and EJ issues, they still lack the funds and manpower needed in order to have effective regulation. Such corporations also have large influences in the media industry which in turn affects public opinion because of what we see and hear. What is shown in the media is usually subtle enough that it does not raise questions which is a scary thought because we are not able to trust what we see, hear or read anymore.

I will draw more conclusions when I read more of the book.

The Silicon Valley of Dreams - Part 3

The book has since talked about the electronics industry and how the work flows through the system. Chapters 6-7 talks more about the individual experiences of a number of employees that the authors have managed to interview. The chapters also talked about how the families of each worker is also affected in such cases of environmental injustice. In addition to all the above, chapter 7 especially talked about the piece-by-piece assembly process which is done by many immigrant families in the area.

When I was going through the chapters in this book, I momentarily forgot...well...segregated in my mind, the other environmental justice issues that we've talked about so far in this class. The other issues that we talked about in this class had to deal with overall environmental pollution and how people of color tend to live in areas that have a high disproportion of waste facilities etc. This book talked about environmental injustice in the workplace which covered different areas of focus. People were exposed to health hazards but could not do anything about it for fear of being fired from their jobs and losing income to support their families.

There is already a distinction here. In both cases of workplace and living area injustices, it feels like those who encountered workplace injustices had to risk more than those who encountered environmental injustices in where they live. Losing one's job immediately would be bad as they would lose their source of income. Fighting against a corporation that wants to put a dump near your house seem to have less immediate adverse effects.

Reading about the injustices that electronics workers face and the type of management that they have to put up with is disheartening. To think that they risk so much to support their families really is hard to read because as consumers of such goods, we are partially to blame for not asking for better workplace practices and ethics.

Regarding the piece-by-piece assembly from home; one of my friends had her entire family doing such work but it wasn't electronics but plastic instead. It was an additional source of income where everyone in the family would sit down in front of the TV in the evenings and assemble plastic parts. They were paid for each piece that they assembled. I think Asian cultures are very different in a sense that it is more family oriented with relatives pitching in to help if they can. But in the case of the electronics industry, home assembly is probably more dangerous than factory assembly because it also exposes other family members (the elderly and children) to toxic chemicals.

There were also several instances in the book that told of a few small victories achieved by a few of the workers who actually stood up against their employers but I don't think it is enough to combat the injustices that are still going on in the workplace. Also, when the government actually intervened, they also caused harm because all the workers who assembled from home got fired from their jobs. Now how is that helping?

The Silicon Valley of Dreams - Part 2

This book is really interesting to me because firstly, it approaches the issue in a different style because it first examines the history of the place before diving into the issue. The reason being that racism and environmental injustice has been going on for a long time since the Gold Rush - more than 100 years ago. It was interesting to note that although the industries changed from mining to farming and eventually electronics; the racist hierarchy that is very apparent at the workplace did not change. Those who were in the managerial positions were always Caucasian whereas the laborers and workers were mainly minority races.

In addition to this, it was also interesting to note that factories hired laborers of similar nationality in their production plants. By keeping people of different nationalities separate from each other, I suppose it does encourage some sort of indirect racism not just among the supervisors and workers but also among the workers themselves. By segregating the workers by race, the company can possibly reduce the amount of interactions that the workers have with other workers of different races, making it more difficult to organize and fight against workplace injustices.

The fact that companies transferred pregnant women to other departments because the chemicals used caused miscarriages did not make much sense. If the chemicals used were that harmful, we should stop using them altogether for fear of other health issues. When I first read this book, I was surprised to see the number of hazardous waste produced in making electronic products. I've always thought that the manufacturing process of electronics was relatively cleaner compared to other industries in a sense because it did not involve the "smokestacks" and production of soot and black smoke. This was discussed in the book as how the electronics industry was portrayed very early on before people began to realize how polluting they were.

I think some people do see the electronics industry as relatively cleaner than other industries which brings me to a different subject - the media. It is scary to think that the media influences such a large part of our lives. Almost every household in the US owns a TV. Imagine the influence the media has on us. We are being fed information, correct and incorrect on the daily basis and we make decisions and form ideas based on what we see and hear on the TV. I suppose a good way to inform the public regarding the issue of environmental injustice would be to use the media as a tool to help curb environmental injustice by informing the public.

I think it's kind of funny on how we have "fair-trade" items on the market such as coffee and chocolate but we don't have "fair-trade" computers or radios. We are willing to pay more money for items made outside our country than to sustain the local economy by paying higher prices for electronics made in our own country. I guess these are just some of the questions that came up after reading chapters 3-5 in the book.

Resisting Global Toxics (Part 2)

The second part of the book highlights the various NGOs around the world that take part in fighting environmental injustice in various ways. I found it comforting to know that there are such groups in my own country but the funny thing is I don't hear much about them in the media - as in newspaper. And it's not because I don't read the newspapers back home...in fact, I read them religiously. But I think I remember hearing about the incinerator proposal plan for the place in Semenyih in my home state of Selangor. Semenyih is about 40-45 minutes from where I live and although its not as big as my town, it is a good-sized town. It is good to know that the plant proposal did not go through and that such news is actually heard in the international community inspite of not being covered much locally.

I think Malaysia has the potential in being a country that strongly advocates environmentalism and environmental justice in the South East Asia region. But until then, I think we still have a lot to learn especially from our neighbour countries such as the Philippines. After reading about some of the stories of environmental justice advocacy going on in the Philippines, I am encouraged to see the amount of progress going on in their country.

The case-study in the book regarding Haiti was interesting but at the same time, disturbing. It was bad enough that the ship dumped the waste onto the beach and said that it was non-hazardous but what was disturbing was the fact that the parties involved dragged their feet in cleaning up the waste. It took them more than 10 years!! I was surprised that it was not a huge international controversy/scandal as it should've been. And the mayor of the city of Philadelphia at that time who was Al Gore, did not do much about it...unless I misread something. So he was/is an advocate of environmentalism (ie. global warming etc.) but he is not an advocate for environmental justice?

I guess this is where the disconnect comes between environmentalists and environmental justice advocates. Maybe...maybe he couldn't get the grant but he personally felt compelled to do something but he couldn't just make the decision although he was in that position of power. After reading that little excerpt, I supposed it tarnished my image of Al Gore and that added even more to the fact that I was already a slight skeptic in the first place. I've always wondered what was his motivation in doing what he is currently doing. Hmm...

I think my posts are going to be more political because that's what people are talking about these days. By the way, has anyone watched "An inconvenient truth"? What did you think about it?

Resisting Global Toxics (Part 1)

As I read the 2 beginning chapters of the book, it reminded me of another class I took last semester which was Environmental Politics and Policy. One of the key concepts we discussed in that class was regarding how society has changed from pre-modern, to modern and to finally post modern. I liked how post-modern society is framed as a risk society. I don't think very many people will immediately view society today as one that exposes themselves to constant risk. But I think it is a very true statement because science has brought about so many innovations but at the same time, we have exposed ourselves to risks that we do not know of, especially in the long run. The anti-thesis of the risk society would be that of a society that follows the precautionary principle - which is to avoid even doing something if we're not even sure of the risks that might come out of it.

I do not neccessary like the idea that we are living in a risk society but I feel in terms of some of the benefits that we currently have, it would be better than just following the precautionary principle. This is because I feel like the precautionary principle is another extreme end of the spectrum. If we stop doing things just because there could be inherent risk attached to it; I can think of some (probably silly) examples. Take for example, if we followed the precautionary principle, we as mankind will fail to learn new things in comparision to what we now know. Imagine when man first discovered fire. If he chose to stay far away from it because of the fear of burning himself or the place that he lived, we wouldn't be here today. Like I said, it's a sort of silly example but you get the idea.

I also liked the idea of toxic colonialism as compared to regular colonialism. I mean, it makes sense because "western" developed countries are dumping their garbage in poor under-developed countries. I guess things never really changed over time which was what I didn't expect. I mean, to know that things are still the same is quite sad. Powerful governments and corporations will always seek the path of least resistance and the idea of the corporatization of governments was something I never came across until I read the first chapter. It is strange to see how governments today are run like businesses - which will eventually promote self-interest but I hope it doesn't go as far as that on a large scale because then, governments will be pointless.

I guess I'm also excited to see the results of the upcoming elections. I think it will make a big difference to who gets elected into office. I did a research paper on the energy and environmental policies of both candidates for my other class and as far as I can tell, I prefer Obama's policies because it would make a larger desirable impact compared to McCain's.

But we'll see who wins...