PEN-L Comrads,
I just completed a 7,500 piece on Dow and Higher Ed. It's a little tricky because Dow is headquartered in Midland, Michigan, in the belly of the state. . . .I came up with lots of great stuff. . . .here's the beginning of it. . .it won't be published till january. . .please do not share or forward with anyone. . .
Does any of this soiund familiar?
Brian
DOW Chemical's Dioxin Scandal Heats-Up
Michigan Universities Need to Create True Higher Learning about Dow Chemical
by Brian McKenna
"Growth [is] the opiate we're all hooked on. . ."
Frank Popoff, former CEO of DOW Chemical
In Growth Company, DOW Chemical's First Century, MSU Press (1997)
"Growth for whom?"
In Dying for Growth, Global Inequality and the Health of the Poor (2000)
Three Bhopal activists were shot dead at a Dow Chemical facility in Piscataway, New Jersey on December 14, 2003, in a mock anti-terrorist drill. In the scenario, reported by the New Jersey Star-Ledger, Piscataway police, dressed as Bhopal activists, stormed the Dow facility, took 8 Dow workers hostage and killed one. Later a SWAT team took out the three "terrorists."
For the record, Bhopal activists - seeking redress for Dow's failure to compensate victims of the worst industrial accident of all time - have never committed violence at a Dow plant. The slur had no basis in fact.
In this post-911 age activists are often equated with terrorists when they are just exercising their First Amendment rights. What does this reveal about Dow's attitude towards those seeking social justice?
In Midland, this past Spring 2003, Michigan State University filmmaker Steve Maedic was taking digital video footage of the Dow chemical facility while sitting in the back wagon of his pick-up truck as his girlfriend drove on a public road. They were pulled over and detained by Dow security and later Midland police. "We were really scared," he later said. Maedic, a student in MSU's environmental journalism program, was making a documentary on dioxin pollution in Midland and downstream. Police took his picture and let him go.
If Dow Chemical feels threatened, that's probably because they're weary from a long litany of conflicts and scandals, on top of poor "growth" in 2002 when they lost $338 million, some of which was due to some unexpected costs associated with acquiring Union Carbide. In addition to Bhopal there's been conflict over asbestos, breast implants, vinyl chloride contamination in Louisiana, labor decertification campaigns in Texas, union fights in Midland, and - the primary subject of this story - dioxin pollution in Michigan. And that's just a sampling of recent controversies.
But Dow has many creative ways of advancing its interests that do not involve force. They can use their enormous money and influence -- befitting the 51st richest company in the world.
Consider this.
Young Steve Maedic made his 90 minute documentary "The Long Shadow" - a critical investigation of Dow's dioxin dealings with Michigan state government - on a shoestring budget, as a master's project for his environmental journalism degree. Meanwhile, just down the hall from the environmental journalism offices at MSU's Communication Arts Building, a fledgling new undergraduate Public Relations specialization is getting off the ground. It's in honor of E. N. Brandt, whose 1997 book, "Growth Company, Dow Chemical's First Century," largely sings the praises of "one of the wonders of the modern business world." The endowed E. N. Brandt chair was the result of a $1,300,000 gift to MSU from the Carl Gerstander Foundation in 2000.
And who is Carl Gerstander? The former CEO of Dow Chemical.
It turns out that Brandt had worked for Dow for 40 years, beginning his career in the PR department in 1953 and rising to become Dow's company historian. The Dow book - largely financed by Dow - and endowed chair will have a lasting legacy on MSU culture. In contrast, Maedic's documentary - due for completion in 2004 - is still trying to find a distribution market. He's hoping for a local PBS showing.
It's a good bet that only a handful of MSU faculty and students are aware of these Dow/MSU connections and ironies. As we'll see Dow's influence throughout Michigan's universities is quite extensive.
But we must return to Brandt's book because the thick volume represents Dow's view of the world, enshrined and legitimized by a Big Ten university.
Brandt's book on Dow dismisses dioxin's real-life dangers, citing study after study apparently disproving a health problem. He tells the story of a 60 minutes crew who arrived in Midland, soon after Times Beach Missouri was evacuated for dioxin pollution in 1982, "expecting Midland to be the next town evacuated because of dioxin contamination." "They came at the busiest weekend of the year," Brandt quotes a Dow official as saying, "everybody's laughing and having a big time at the art fair, and the antique show you have to see to believe. . .They're having trouble finding beleaguered folks. To make a long story short, with the exception of a few environmentalists from a local organization, they gave up. That story just went away because they could not find any substance for their story line."
The 649 page effort (in which a Dow Chemical's Thayne Hanson served as one of the five members of the Editorial Advisory Committee, along with other chemical professionals like James J. Bohning of the American Chemical Society) spends a great deal of time defending Dow against various interlocutors. In a chapter called "Flower Children" Brandt dismisses all the "napalm hubbub" of Vietnam war activists claiming that napalm was of little consequence to civilians and was "a great service for the armed forces," quoting a letter Secretary of Defense McNamara. He defends Dow against the 1941 charge by the U.S. Justice Department that Dow conspired with the Nazi's I.F. Farben (Dow later pleaded nolo contendere), but fails to mention Dow's 1951 hiring of Otto Ambros, the Nazi war criminal convicted at Nuremberg for slavery and mass murder in the killing of thousands of Jews with nerve gas (well detailed in the excellent 1991 book Secret Agenda by Linda Hunt). He informs us that Dow was the first company to receive a phone call from Pinochet's military in 1973 soon after his forces assassinated democratically elected Chilean President Allende, toppling his government asking Dow to come back, which Dow "readily accepted" (a Dow official saluting the economic "miracle" of Pinochet), but tells us nothing about the 10,000 disappeared in the war. He relays insider knowledge that Presidential candidate Eisenhower was tapped to take over Dow's Saran Wrap division should his Presidential bid fail but says nothing about Eisenhower's famous farewell speech in which he rallied against America's rising military-industrial complex.
Of which Dow is a leading exemplar.
The MSU book contract - with a non-academic corporate public relations man penning an apologia for Dow - and the MSU endowed chair in public relations (PR being the conscious, intelligent manipulation of citizens) raise questions about the politics, ideology and culture of higher education, in this instance, MSU's relationship to Dow Chemical. But as we'll discuss, Dow Chemical has established strong financial and political relationships with most Michigan universities, from the University of Michigan to tiny Albion College. All bear scrutiny.
We'll review the rising movement to make Dow accountable for its dioxin pollution in Michigan. Then we'll discuss Dow Chemical's influence on the curricula and culture of Michigan universities. Finally we'll discuss some strategies to create true higher learning about Dow.
