Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
made your shirt, but the
comparatively
comfortable living standards of the
workers in a Dhaka factory may depend, through only a few more steps,
upon the poverty of that person. We are all part of a vast economic food
chain. I, the writer, and you, the reader, live towards the top of this pyramid,
though we are only dimly aware of the apex above us. Way below us there
lives the textile worker - yet her fingers may have touched my shirt. And only
a few rungs below her there live people who are truly in abject poverty, expe-
riencing extremely restricted, vulnerable and powerless lives.
This economic pyramid has been growing in size and height for centu-
ries. Today the magnitude of inequality in the global system is unprece-
dented, and it is breathtaking. Five hundred years ago, kings were still prone
to diseases that are today easily curable, though they were probably always
spared from hunger. Today, despite our knowledge of vaccines, antibiotics,
education, and our vast
collective
wealth, hundreds of millions of people
continue to miss out, in ways that would be regarded as totally unacceptable
if they were either more visible, or more organised and threatening.
Of course, there are complex reasons for inequality, and many causes are
far from tractable. But, for a few decades, especially after World War II, sub-
stantial progress was made in making the world fairer. A combination of
enlightened self-interest, idealism, new technologies and Cold War competi-
tion saw vast improvements in the living conditions in many parts of the
Third World. Life expectancies rose dramatically, roads were built, literacy
increased and birth rates fell quickly. The Green Revolution assuaged the
fears of famine that had risen to prominence in the 1960s.
Sometime around 1980 much of this progress petered out. The reasons
for this include economic shifts in the West, as stagflation and an overly
trusting Western population allowed the installation of policies that placed a
greater emphasis upon individual than collective goods. Originally these
policies were proclaimed as the new, smart, way to
reduce
inequality and to
improve public goods, both nationally and globally. The wisdom of the
market was alleged to automatically result in greater total wealth, which
would result in a beneficial 'trickle down' effect, reaching not only our own
poor, but also the poor in the Third World. Consequently, it was considered
rational and humane to slash foreign aid and reduce subsidies that lowered
the costs of Third World schooling and health care. We were assured this
would accelerate development.
