Journal of World-Systems Research
Volume 3, Number 3 (Fall 1997)
http://csf.colorado.edu/wsystems/jwsr.html
ISSN 1076-156X
World-system Studies of the Environment
by
Tim Bartley
Department of Sociology
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
and
Albert Bergesen
Department of Sociology
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cite: Bartley, Tim, and Albert Bergesen. (1997). "World-system Studies
of the Environment." Journal of World-Systems Research
(http://csf.colorado.edu/wsystems/jwsr.html) 3: 369 - 380.
ABSTRACT: The world-system idea has been used to explain a great deal
about national institutional life, from rates of
economic growth to changing patterns of schooling. One of the newer
areas of interest is the environment. In the following
review we examine scholarship that deals with environmental problems
from a distinctly world systemic perspective.
© 1997 Tim Bartley & Albert Bergesen.
[Page 369]
Journal of World-Systems Research
1. Environmental Degradation
1.1 Deforestation
Several quantitative studies have shown that the semiperiphery is the
site of the most intense deforestation (Burns, Kick,
Murray, and Murray 1994; Kick, Burns, Davis, Murray, and Murray 1996).
First, there is a long history of exploitation of
peripheral and semiperipheral forests by core countries, and as Chew
(1996) notes there is an historical association between
colonialism and deforestation in Southeast Asia. Spain and Portugal,
Holland, Britain, and the U.S. have all exploited Asian
forests during their periods of dominance in the world-system. When a
country is rapidly developing and rising to a hegemonic
status its level of timber consumption rises. Japan for instance has
recently experienced a dramatic increase in wood and
timber consumption, with as much as 50% of log imports and 98% of
plywood imports coming from southeast Asia.
Second, while population growth leads to deforestation in all sectors of
the world-system, its effects are exacerbated in the
semiperiphery, as population growth necessitates the production of more
lumber and thus leads to deforestation (Kick et al.
1996). Yet Burns et al. (1994) and Kick et al. (1996) find that for
semiperipheral countries, rural population growth is a better
predictor of deforestation than is total population growth, arguing that
urban concentration in the semiperiphery causes landless
people to migrate out of the city into forested areas--what is called
the process of rural encroachment. Since these migrants
possess little knowledge of agricultural practices they end up
contributing to deforestation. Much more deforestation is
attributable to 'slash and burn' activity by landless migrant poor
people, conversion of forests to pasture land, and
over-harvesting of fuel wood, than it is to commercial logging (Burns et
al. 1994:225). Although the process of rural
encroachment occurs within a society, the urbanization that leads to
out-migration is a consequence of rapid uneven
development of semiperipheral countries in the world-system.
In addition, semiperipheral countries deforest more than others because
of their position of potential upward mobility in the
world-system, which leads them to place more weight on industrialization
than on environmental protection.1 Smith (1994)
notes that Newly Industrializing Countries (NICs) tend to have lax
environmental regulations. Because of their potential for
economic development, semiperipheral countries are more eager to reap
the economic benefits of forest exploitation than are
developed countries. Further, semiperipheral countries have a greater
technological capability to deforest than do peripheral
countries (Burns et al. 1994; Kick et al. 1996).
Such semiperipheral states have historically allowed or even encouraged
deforestation in attempting to economically develop.
Chew (1996) provides an example in his analysis of post-colonial
southeast Asia. He argues that attempts to build export-led
economies and Western-style states have secured the cooperation of
political elites and transnational corporations in exploiting
forests. Nazmi (1991), though not espousing a world-system perspective,
offers a similar example for the case of Brazil,
noting that government incentives for cattle ranching have increased
deforestation; badly defined property rights have
encouraged small-scale, destructive agriculture; and an emphasis on pig
iron production has necessitated deforestation in order
to allow the planting of eucalyptus trees used in iron production. If
Southeast Asian and Brazilian examples of state facilitated
deforestation are generalizable to other semiperipheral countries, then
the study of deforestation illustrates a more general
process. States are important units of analysis, but since they act in
the context of the world-system, they cannot be treated as
self-contained entities.
[Page 370]
Journal of World-Systems Research
States are tied to the world-system through international trade, and
trade in forest products is another factor related to
deforestation. One would expect that major exporters of forest products
would experience high levels of deforestation.
Conversely, one would expect that when a country imports forest
products, it should not need to deplete its own forests. Yet
Kick et al. (1996) find that these expectations hold up only for core
countries, not for semiperipheral ones. Interestingly, in
semiperipheral countries both the export and import of forest products
leads to deforestation. This is because core countries
are able to export forest products without high rates of deforestation
because they often utilize reforestation practices. (While
reforestation results in old-growth forests being replaced by young
trees, these are nonetheless counted as forests). When
core countries import timber, they need to exploit fewer of their own
forest resources, but when semiperipheral countries
import timber it often indicates building infrastructure, which damages
forested lands regardless of the source of the forest
products used. In sum, whether core countries import or export forest
products, they experience less deforestation.
Semiperipheral countries, on the other hand, are in a lose-lose
situation; whether they export or import forest products, the
result is deforestation2.
1.2 Global Warming and the Curvilinear Hypothesis
A second environmental problem that has been studied from a world-system
perspective is global warming. The two
Greenhouse gases--carbon dioxide and methane--are emitted through
different processes. Carbon dioxide is produced
directly through fossil-fuel use and indirectly through deforestation.
Methane production occurs through wet rice agriculture,
livestock, uncontrolled coal mine emissions, and petroleum and natural
gas leakages (Burns, Davis, and Kick 1997).
In their study of emissions of these two gases, Burns et al. (1997) find
that carbon dioxide is produced mostly in highly
developed and methane in less developed countries. They create the
category "semicore" in order to distinguish between
stronger (semicore) and weaker (semiperipheral) states that have
previously been lumped together as semiperipheral. This
strength can be seen primarily in terms of global network ties, but
typically is reflected domestically as well (Burns et al.
1997:10). The semicore includes the weak, non-core countries of Eastern
and Western Europe, as well as China, Israel,
Australia, and Brazil. The semiperiphery thus consists of the remaining
countries that have normally been called semiperipheral.
The social dynamics by which Greenhouse gases are differentially emitted
vary with countries' world-system position (Burns et
al. 1997). Core countries produce the most carbon dioxide, followed by
the semicore, semiperiphery, and periphery. The high
level of energy consumption in the core, which results from a high
standard of living, explains the primacy of the core in
producing carbon dioxide and the decreasing levels of such production
for each less affluent sector of the world-system. The
semicore produces the most methane, followed by the core, semiperiphery,
and periphery. Burns et al. (1997) suggest that the
movement of commercial cattle ranching from core to semicore countries
and the association of agriculture with methane
production explain the high levels of this Greenhouse gas produced
there.
[Page 371]
Journal of World-Systems Research
These findings suggest that the relation between world-system position
and Greenhouse gas emission does not mirror the
relation between world-system position and economic development.
Economically, there is a clear hierarchy from core to
periphery, but the core is not the exclusive emitter of Greenhouse
gases, nor is it able to transfer all production of these gases
to less developed areas. World-system dynamics (e.g. concentration of
wealth and power in the core) are likely to manifest
themselves in a number of ways, which may include environmental outcomes
that are most severe somewhere other than the
core (Burns et al. 1997:32). Economic relations structure the
world-system, but they cannot be simplistically projected onto
areas such as environmental degradation. For instance, while the
relationship between economic and socio-political
development is essentially linear, the relationship between economic
development and toxic emissions seems to be curvilinear.
Interestingly, it is only in the last twenty years that the relationship
between development and emissions has become
increasingly curvilinear in the shape of an inverted U (Roberts and
Grimes 1997; Grimes and Roberts 1995; Grimes, Roberts,
and Manale 1994). That is, currently, emission of carbon dioxide per
unit GDP increases with increases in GDP per capita up
to around $8,000-10,000 GDP per capita, at which point the relationship
begins to curve downward (Roberts and Grimes
1997; Grimes and Roberts 1995; Dietz and Rosa 1997; Hettige, Lucas, and
Wheeler 1992; Lucas, Wheeler, and Hettige
1992). In other words emissions are most intense in moderately developed
(semiperipheral) countries and less intense in less
developed (peripheral) and highly developed (core) countries.3 Roberts
and Grimes (1997) thus liken this pattern to the
observed Kuznets curvilinear relation between income inequality and
national development which indicates that as a country
develops, its inequality first increases, then begins to decrease. Yet
the environmental Kuznets curve is not exactly analogous
to the original Kuznets curve because the environmental curve is found
by looking at countries with different levels of
development, not at particular countries' processes of development. The
emergence of an inverted U-curve is the result not of
individual countries passing through stages of development, but of a
relatively small number of wealthy ones becoming more
efficient since 1970 while the rest of the world worsens (Roberts and
Grimes 1997:196). It is also doubtful that most countries
will develop to the point of decreasing carbon dioxide emissions
(Roberts and Grimes 1997; Dietz and Rosa 1997). While
more affluent countries still contribute the most to overall carbon
dioxide emissions, what the environmental Kuznets curve
findings suggests is that they pollute less intensely, or exhibit more
societal efficiency than less developed countries (Grimes
and Roberts 1995). Bergesen, Parisi, and Downey (1996) identify two
possible explanations for the decreased intensity of
emissions in core countries: (1) developed countries possess newer and
cleaner technologies than do core countries. (2) they
have moved from manufacturing toward service-oriented economies. Lucas
et al. (1992) and Hettige et al. (1992) support the
latter possibility by showing that, when pollution intensity is measured
per unit of industrial output rather than unit of GDP, the
inverted U-shaped relation nearly disappears. Intensity of manufacturing
output rises steadily with income, at most tapering off
somewhat at very high incomes (Hettige et al. 1992:479). In other words,
new technologies do not seem to be cleaning up
industrial production.
[Page 372]
Journal of World-Systems Research
2. Natural Resources and Development
Environmental degradation is not just caused by development dynamics,
but such degradation can become the context in
which future development must occur. Bunker (1984, 1985) shows the
impact of both ecological degradation and natural
resources on political and economic development/underdevelopment. He
argues that Brazil's underdevelopment,
environmental degradation, and state bureaucratic procedures are tightly
linked and each has impacted the other. Once Brazil
was incorporated into the world-system in the 16th century, processes of
natural resource extraction decimated the indigenous
population and their ecologically sound technologies and huge numbers of
slaves died on expeditions for sugar and spices that
only got longer as local resources were depleted. In addition European
trade in animal oils reduced the indigenous population's
food supply and disturbed fragile ecosystems. As the natural resource
base declined, so did the Amazonian economy. This
depletion of the rural population meant that during the Brazilian rubber
boom of the mid to late 19th century, capitalists' costs
were increased by the necessity of recruiting workers from urban areas.
These high costs eventually led to the downfall of the
Brazilian economy, as rubber came to be produced more efficiently on
English plantations in Asia. In the wake of the rubber
boom, the Brazilian environment was further depleted and degraded as
those laborers remaining from the rubber boom
over-farmed fragile land and traded in animal skins which further
disturbed the ecosystem. Environmental conditions are seen
as both consequence and cause of Amazonian underdevelopment:
The depopulation, environmental disruption, and demographic and economic
dislocations brought about by the previous
modes of extraction created the conditions for both large-scale
capitalist enterprise and government economic planners to
treat the Amazon as an empty frontier from which profits could be
rapidly and wastefully extracted with little regard for, or
sustained economic participation by, existing socioeconomic or
environmental systems (Bunker 1985:77).
Bunker's theoretical notions are also closely tied to processes in
nature, as his ecological model of uneven development
(1985:49) is inspired by the second law of thermodynamics. This
principle of entropy states that while there can be no net loss
of energy, the transformation of energy from one form to another will
result in it becoming increasingly disorganized, or
degraded (Erlich, Erlich, and Holdren 1993). Underdevelopment in
economies based on natural resource extraction is a
function of the core's ability to obtain useful forms of energy from the
periphery and semiperiphery, degrading the latter. If
energy and matter necessarily flow from extractive to productive
economies, it follows that social and economic processes will
be intensified and accelerated in the productive economy and will become
more diffuse and eventually decelerate in the
extractive economy (Bunker 1985:47). In addition, Bunker (1985) argues,
economies based on the extraction of natural
resources necessitate a theory of development based on the mode of
extraction rather than one based on the mode of
production since forms of energy cannot be reproduced and sustained in
the same sense as labor and capital.
[Page 373]
Journal of World-Systems Research
Access to natural resources in the rise to hegemonic status is explored
by Bunker and Ciccantell (1997), who argue that
ascendancy requires the implementation of new strategies for entering
raw material markets and accommodating to the natural
environment. These strategies include imperialist conquest of
resource-rich peripheries, technological innovations that
effectively change established relations between economy and
environment, and the shifting of capital costs and financial risks
to peripheries (Bunker and Ciccantell 1997:10). Technological
innovations in Holland, Britain, and the U.S. served to increase
the scale at which natural resource extraction and transport occurred.
Japan's recent ascent has also hinged largely on its
ability to convince semiperipheral countries, who occupy a weak
bargaining position, to assume the costs of tailoring transport
infrastructures to Japanese specifications as well as the costs of
environmental protection (Bunker and Ciccantell 1997, 1995;
Bunker 1994).
The rise of countries from periphery to semiperiphery has also been
facilitated by natural resource strategies. There has been a
raw materials route to the semiperiphery that has existed since World
War II. Venezuela, Brazil, Iran, Mexico, Saudi Arabia,
India, and others have diversified their production away from dependence
on exporting a single raw material to gaining
investment from Trans-National Corporations to develop domestic
industries that process several resources (Ciccantell
1994). Of course, such a rise to the semiperiphery requires, in addition
to sufficient political and economic causes, that large
deposits of diverse raw materials exist in these countries.
3. Environmental Constraints and Social Change
Chase-Dunn and Hall (1996,1997) operate on a larger and more abstract
level, namely the changes in world-systems in the
12,000 years since the establishment of sedentary societies. They
propose an ecological and evolutionary theory of the
formation and expansion of world-systems that recognizes the ways in
which environmental constraints direct the formation of
world-systems and more energy-intensive economic practices. They propose
an iterative model of long term social change
that identifies recurring processes linking population pressure,
environmental degradation, hierarchy formation, and economic
intensification, arguing that social change occurs as a consequence of
populations expanding beyond their ecological base.4
The iterative model accounts for the formation of hierarchical
world-systems as follows: Population growth leads to ecological
degradation, which limits the natural resources available to the
population at the existing level of effort. When such a condition
of population pressure exists, people tend to emigrate to new regions.
If emigration is inhibited by geographical features or
other populations--environmental or social circumscription--people may
develop new technologies of production to sustain
themselves in the face of scarcity or they may come into conflict over
the existing resources. If conflict takes the form of war,
enough people may be killed that population pressure is reduced.
Alternatively, conflict may lead to the formation of
hierarchical polities, which foster technological intensification.
Technological intensification contributes directly to further
population growth and environmental degradation. These processes occur
repeatedly, and thus there is an increase in both the
scale of world-systems and the scale of environmental degradation.
[Page 374]
Journal of World-Systems Research
Chase-Dunn and Hall's model applies even to complex societies
characterized by capitalism and large markets. When
societies become more complex, several new paths of change become
possible. Institutional structures allow population
pressure to lead directly to new hierarchies and technologies, bypassing
the basic path of the model through circumscription
and conflict. Unlike other theories of long term change, here the
development of a capitalist world-system does not radically
alter the logic of the theory. In periods of system expansion, the
superstructure of geopolitical accumulation overrides the
underlying demographic and resource scarcity constraints of the
iteration model (Chase-Dunn and Hall 1997:112). Yet in
periods of contraction, the superstructural dynamics fade and these
constraints re-emerge.
Even the contemporary global world-system is subject to demographic and
ecological constraints, and Chase-Dunn and Hall
suggest that such constraints could turn periods of contraction into
crises and allow for a transformation to a socialist
world-system. The crucial point here, from both a theoretical and
environmental standpoint, is that current environmental
factors do not lose their importance just because local constraints are
increasingly replaced by global constraints in the
contemporary world-system.
Another approach is taken by O'Connor (1994) who theorizes the issue of
an ecological crisis for capitalism from a
perspective different from Chase-Dunn and Hall. He brings the
environment into a Marxist analysis of global capitalism,
arguing that environmental degradation produced through capitalist
enterprise constitutes a "second contradiction" of
capitalism. Marx's first contradiction asserted that capitalism's
exploitation and alienation of the proletariat would lead to the
overthrow of the system. O'Connor's eco-Marxism now shifts the focus to
capitalism's exploitation of the natural environment.
As capital degrades the environment, it increases the costs of future
expansion and thus leads to its own demise. O'Connor
says:
Cost-side crises originate in two ways. The first is when individual
capitals defend or restore profits by strategies that degrade
or fail to maintain over time the material conditions of their own
production, for example, by neglecting work conditions (hence
raising the health bill), degrading soils (hence lowering the
productivity of land), or turning their backs on decaying urban
infrastructures (hence increasing congestion costs). The second is when
social movements demand that capital better provides
for the maintenance and restoration for these conditions of life
(1994:162).
The demise of social systems throughout time has also been a result of
ecological degradation, according to Chew (1997) who
argues that the Bronze Age civilizations of Mesopotamia and Harappa
represent core centers that were significantly
interconnected economically. Through these economic ties, environmental
degradation both inside and outside each core
center contributed to that center's economic crises.
[Page 375]
Journal of World-Systems Research
Therefore, an ecological crisis in Mesopotamia might mean the lowering
of agricultural output or production, and consequently
a reduction in the overall supply of goods to other parts of the system.
Concomitantly, such reductions would impact on other
regions such as Dilmun and Harappan in terms of a diminished demand for
their materials and goods (Chew 1997:19).
4. Regimes, Movements, and World Polities
Environmental degradation poses practical problems for people and states
today. Political action directed toward
environmental regulation is obviously related to the increasing scale
and intensity of degradation in the last century. Yet
increased degradation does not seem to fully explain the rise of
international environmental regimes or social movements.
Frank (1994) argues that increasing participation in environmental
treaties is due not simply to increased degradation, but to a
reconstitution of the concept of nature into an ecosystem paradigm.
Through a content analysis of environmental treaties, he
shows that international discourse has gone from viewing nature as a
realm of chaos and savagery, and away from conceptions
of nature as a cornucopia of resources to recognizing planet-wide
interdependencies (Frank, 1994:2). In addition, through an
event-history analysis of the number of treaties, he shows that the
increasing coherence of a world polity has led to more
treaties, while the consolidation and routinization of governmental
mechanisms for dealing with environmental problems tends
to decrease the number of international treaties. In other words, as the
politics of the world-system have become more global,
international environmental treaties have become more prevalent. Frank
(1995) also argues that it is social rather than
economic ties to the world-system that determine the level of a state's
participation in international environmental regulation.
He finds that social ties to world society are related more consistently
and strongly to the ratification of environmental treaties
than are economic development and political structure. As an ecosystem
cultural frame has gained strength global associations,
states and organizations have used world-system social networks to
pressure others to participate, and environmental
regulation has become more closely associated with state legitimacy.
While Frank (1994, 1995) focuses on world-system cultural constructions
and network ties, Roberts (1996) explains
environmental treaty participation strictly on the basis of political
and economic factors. He finds that indicators of
world-system position and internal political climate are both
determinants of environmental treaty participation. The likelihood
of participation decreases with national wealth, indebtedness,
dependence on few trading partners, and the existence of a
repressive state government. Several explanations underlie these
findings. For one, peripheral and semiperipheral countries are
simply less able to participate in treaties. Indebtedness also
discourages a country from risking its ability to produce raw
materials by participating in treaties and countries that are dependent
on few trading partners are more economically
vulnerable and therefore less likely to alienate their trading partners
by signing a treaty. Repressive regimes are also not
sensitive to popular demands for regulation and therefore not likely to
sign environmental treaties. While the finding that
repressive states are unlikely to participate argues for the importance
of democracy, Roberts finds that world-system position
is consistently the best predictor of participation.
[Page 376]
Journal of World-Systems Research
Although peripheral and semiperipheral countries seem unlikely to
participate in environmental treaties, they may spawn
environmental social movements. Smith (1994) has made preliminary
arguments for connections between levels of
development/world-system position and movement emergence. He points out
that Newly Industrializing Countries are in a
contradictory situation: their upward mobility leads to environmental
degradation yet creates conditions of urbanization and
education that are favorable toward the emergence of social movements
acting in opposition to polluting industries. Smith
provides only introductory remarks on environmental antisystemic
movements, but it is possible to hypothesize that the
combination of severe environmental degradation and urbanization in
semiperipheral countries would make them the most
fertile ground for the growth of environmental movements. Schaeffer
(1997) makes a similar hypothesis arguing that the
environmental movement finally began to grow in peripheral countries in
the 1980's because of democratization and increased
perceptions of resource scarcity caused by the debt crisis and austerity
programs. During the 1970's on the other hand,
environmental movements did not take hold in the periphery though they
were prevalent in the U.S. and most other core
countries, as many in the periphery associated environmentalism with the
U.S. government, its imperialist foreign policy and
population control efforts. In addition, the same wave of inflation that
helped create the perception of resource scarcity in core
countries was increasing incomes in energy and natural resource-based
economies.
Conclusion
World-System studies of the environment primarily answer questions about
environmental degradation, natural resources,
long-term social change, and forms of environmental activism. They also
provide insight into more general world-system
dynamics: upward mobility in the semiperiphery, evolutionary growth and
transformation of world-systems, and state action in
a hierarchical world-system. Incorporating the environment into
world-system research allows us to recognize a material base
that is ecological as well as economic and to consider the environment a
possible independent variable.
References
Bergesen, Albert, Laura Parisi, and Liam Downey. 1996. "Development and
Pollution: Is the Relationship Curvilinear?"
Presented at the annual meeting of the International Studies
Association, April, San Diego, CA.
Bunker, Stephen G. 1984. Modes of Extraction, Unequal Exchange, and the
Progressive Underdevelopment of an Extreme
Periphery: The Brazilian Amazon. American Journal of Sociology
89:1017-64.
[Page 377]
Journal of World-Systems Research
------. 1985. Underdeveloping the Amazon: Extraction, Unequal Exchange,
and the Failure of the Modern State.
Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
------. 1994. Flimsy Joint Ventures in Fragile Environments. Pp.261-96
in States, Firms, and Raw Materials: The World
Economy and Ecology of Aluminum, edited by B. Barham, S. Bunker, and D.
O'Hearn. Madison: University of Wisconsin
Press.
Bunker, Stephen and Paul S. Ciccantell. 1995. Restructuring Space, Time
and Competitive Advantage in the Capitalist
World-Economy: Japan and Raw Materials Transport after World War II. Pp.
109-129 in A New World Order? Global
Transformation in the Late Twentieth Century, edited by D. A. Smith and
J. Borocz. Westport, CT: Greenwood.
------. 1997. Economic Ascent and the Global Environment: World Systems
Theory and the New Historical Materialism.
Presented at the Political Economy of the world-system XXI Conference,
April, Santa Cruz, CA.
Burns, Thomas J., Byron L. Davis, and Edward L. Kick. 1997. Position in
the World-System and National Emissions of
Greenhouse Gases. Revision of paper presented at the National
Third-World Studies Conference, October, Omaha, NB.
Burns, Thomas J., Edward L. Kick, David A. Murray, and Dixie A. Murray.
1994. Demography, Development and
Deforestation in a World-System Perspective. International Journal of
Comparative Sociology 35:221-239.
Carneiro, Robert L. 1970. A Theory of the Origin of the State. Science
169 (August):733-738.
Chase-Dunn, Christopher and Thomas D. Hall. 1996. Ecological Degradation
and the Evolution of World-Systems.
Presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological
Association, August, New York, NY.
------. 1997. Rise and Demise: Comparing World-Systems. Boulder, CO:
Westview.
Chew, Sing C. 1996. Wood, Environmental Imperatives and Developmental
Strategies: Challenges for Southeast Asia. Pp.
206-226 in Asia-Who Pays for Growth? Women, Environment, and Popular
Movements, edited by J. Lele and W.
Tettey. Brookfield, VT: Darmouth.
------. 1997. Ecological Relations and the Decline of Kingdoms and
Civilizations 2500BC to 1700BC: Some Considerations
on Mesopotamia and Harappa. Presented at the Political Economy of the
World System XXI Conference, April, Santa Cruz,
CA.
Ciccantell, Paul S. 1994. The Raw Materials Route to the Semiperiphery:
Raw Materials, State Development Policies and
Mobility in the Capitalist World-System. Presented at the annual meeting
of the American Sociological Association, August,
Los Angeles, CA.
Cohen, Mark. 1977. The Food Crisis in Prehistory. New Haven: Yale
University Press.
Dietz, Thomas, and Eugene A. Rosa. 1997. Effects of Population and
Affluence on CO2 Emissions. Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences of the USA 94(Jan.):175-79.
Ehrlich, Paul R., Anne H. Ehrlich, and John P. Holdren. 1993.
Availability, Entropy, and the Laws of Thermodynamics.
Pp.69-73 in Valuing the Earth: Economics, Ecology, Ethics, edited by H.
Daly and K. Townsend. Cambridge, MA: The
MIT Press.
Frank, David John. 1994. Science, Nature, and the Globalization of the
Environment, 1870-1990. Presented at the annual
meeting of the American Sociological Association, August, Los Angeles,
CA.
[Page 378]
Journal of World-Systems Research
------. 1995. The Nation-State and the Natural Environment, 1900-1995.
Presented at the annual meeting of the American
Sociological Association, August, Washington, DC.
Grimes, Peter E. and J. Timmons Roberts. 1995. Carbon Dioxide Emissions
Efficiency and Economic Development.
Presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological
Association, August, Washington, DC.
Grimes, Peter E., J. Timmons Roberts, and Jodie L. Manale. 1994. Social
Roots of Environmental Damage: A world-systems
Analysis of Global Warming and Deforestation. Revision of paper
presented at the annual meeting of the American
Sociological Association, August, Miami Beach, FL.
Harris, Marvin. 1977. Cannibals and Kings: The Origins of Cultures. New
York: Random House.
------. 1979. Cultural Materialism: The Struggle for a Science of
Culture. New York: Random House.
Hettige, Hemamala, Robert E.B. Lucas, and David Wheeler. 1992. The Toxic
Intensity of Industrial Production: Global
Patterns, Trends, and Trade Policy.? American Economics Review
82:478-81.
Kick, Edward L., Thomas J. Burns, Byron Davis, David A. Murray, and
Dixie A. Murray. 1996. Impacts of Domestic
Population Dyamics and Foreign Wood Trade on Deforestation: A
World-System Perspective. Journal of Developing
Societies 12:68-87.
Leonard, H. Jeffrey. 1988. Pollution and the Struggle for the World
Product: Multinational Corporations,
Environment, and International Comparative Advantage. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Low, Patrick, and Alexander Yeats. 1992. Do Dirty Industries Migrate?
Pp. 89-104 in International Trade and the
Environment, edited by P. Low. World Bank Discussion Papers, no. 159.
Washington, DC: International Bank for
Reconstruction and Development/World Bank.
Lucas, Robert E.B., David Wheeler, and Hemamala Hettige. 1992. Economic
Development, Environmental Regulation and
the International Migration of Toxic Industrial Pollution: 1960-88.
Pp.67-86 in International Trade and the Environment,
edited by P. Low. World Bank Discussion Papers, no. 159. Washington, DC:
International Bank for Reconstruction and
Development/World Bank.
Nazmi, Nader. 1991. Deforestation and Ecnomic Growth in Brazil: Lessons
from Conventional Economics. Centennial
Review 35(2):315-322.
O'Connor, James. 1994. Is Sustainable Capitalism Possible? Pp.152-175 in
Is Capitalism Sustainable? Political Economy
and the Politics of Ecology, edited by M. O'Connor. New York: The
Guilford Press.
Roberts, J. Timmons. 1996. Predicting Participation in Environmental
Treaties: A World-System Analysis. Sociological
Inquiry 66:38-57.
Roberts, J. Timmons and Peter E. Grimes. 1997. Carbon Intensity and
Economic Development 1962-91: A Brief Exploration
of the Environmental Kuznets Curve. World Development 25:191-198.
Rudel, Thomas K. 1989. Population, Development, and Tropical
Deforestation: A Cross-National Study. Rural Sociology
54:327-338.
Sanderson, Stephen K. 1995. Social Transformations: A General Theory of
Historical Development. Cambridge, MA:
Blackwell.
Schaeffer, Robert K. 1997. Success and Impasse: The Environmental
Movement in the United States and Around the
World.? Presented at the Political Economy of the world-system XXI
Conference, April, Santa Cruz, CA.
Smith, David A. 1994. Uneven Development and the Environment: Toward a
World-System Perspective. Humboldt Journal
of Social Relations 20:151-175.
Walter, Ingo. 1982. Environmentally Induced Industrial Relocation to
Developing Countries. In Environment and Trade:
The Relation of International Trade and Environmental Policy, edited by
S. Rubin and T. Graham. Totowa, NJ:
Littlefield, Adams, and Co.
[Page 379]
Journal of World-Systems Research
Notes
1See Leonard (1988), Walter (1982), and Low and Yeats (1992) for tests
of the pollution-haven and industrial flight
hypotheses that polluting industries have moved to the countries with
the fewest environmental regulations.
2Rudel (1989) finds countries with large amounts of forested land their
industrialization sustains high rates of deforestation,
which is caused more by rural encroachment than by capital investment.
He uses these findings to cast doubt upon a
world-system analysis that would not take the amount of forested land to
be as important as economic variables. Yet Kick et
al. (1996) do take into account a country's amount of forest and still
find that economic factors such as import and export
dynamics have an effect on deforestation.
3Grimes, Roberts, and Manale (1994) show that carbon dioxide produced
through deforestation accounts for much of the
variation around the inverted U-curve. Consequently, they identify
several variables that help explain the differing levels
deforestation-emissions both across world-system positions and within
world-system positions. They find the greatest intensity
in those countries in the lower periphery having large forest areas, and
where pressure for land in the countryside is also high
(1994:33). The findings seem to contradict Burns et al. (1994) and Kick
et al. (1996), who locate the most intense
deforestation in semiperipheral countries. Grimes et al use a measure of
carbon dioxide from deforestation while the others
use deforestation itself, but it is still not clear why the results
should be so different.
4Chase-Dunn and Hall combine and extend the role accorded to ecological
factors in circumscription (Carneiro 1970, 1981,
1987), resource stress (M. Harris 1977, 1979) and population pressure
(Cohen 1977) theories. These theories account for
the transition to agriculture and the development of hierarchical
societies but not for the development of a world-system (see
also Sanderson 1995).
[Page 380]
Journal of Wo
--
Mine Aysen Doyran
PhD Student
Department of Political Science
SUNY at Albany
Nelson A. Rockefeller College
135 Western Ave.; Milne 102
Albany, NY 12222
____________NetZero Free Internet Access and Email_________
Download Now http://www.netzero.net/download/index.html
Request a CDROM 1-800-333-3633
___________________________________________________________
