it strikes me that just exactly this is happening WITHIN the United States of America. The nuclear waste that can't be got rid of is aimed at the tribes (literally) because they need the money more than almost anybody else within the continental borders. Seems as if a different kind of dump has recently been agreed to by a tribe in Utah, but my memory is vague.Aren't many African political economies undemocratic and internally fractured polities, such that the faction/tribe/etc in government can shift the pollutants to the environments of under-represented factions/tribes/etc?
Gene Coyle
Rob Schaap wrote:
G'day Doug,> So what's the limit on this? What keeps you from descending to the
> horrific Summers/Pritchett level, where the logic of dumping toxic
> waste in Africa is "impeccable"?I think there are lots of ways, even from within the same world view, to argue
this point with the likes of Summers and Pritchett. Questions like, is the
goal of development short-term improvement in GDP or structurally sustainable
long-term (eg. is a life-expectancy of 60 considered to be the ultimate goal
of development)? Is equity with the west considered fundamentally
unattainable at the off (else why propose a pollution differential at the off
- affording the core a structural advantage and the periphery a structural
ceiling)? Would western polluters not pollute more (or pay less to minimise
it) if filth can be produced or moved off-shore? Wouldn't western technology
better inhibit the effects of potential pollutants, and wouldn't it develop
faster if that's where the potential pollutants were?Then, on the road from utilitarianism to institutionalist utilitarianism,
there's: Wouldn't there be a race-to-the-bottom in LDCs for the right to
pollute their environments? Given that so many countries border each other,
wouldn't the sovereignty of one country be undermined by the acceptance of
air/water/soil pollutants by a neighbouring country? Aren't many African
political economies undemocratic and internally fractured polities, such that
the faction/tribe/etc in government can shift the pollutants to the
environments of under-represented factions/tribes/etc?And, one step further along the road away from neo-classicism (indeed, taking
institutionalism unto Marxian ground), should 'the market' (unaccountable
reification and function of geostrategic power differentials that it is) be
the determinant of the who, where and when of death?Cheers,
Rob.
