Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
ways in which international institutions designed to promote equitable
outcomes can have unintended and paradoxical effects.
The fi rst two sections of the topic illustrate the ways inequalities are
perpetrated and often amplifi ed through remote demand and the activi-
ties of international organizations. While all of the chapters consider how
equitable outcomes can be achieved, those in Part III, “Networked
Responses to Global Inequality,” place at the heart of their analysis
the ways governments and civil society actors have dealt with global
pressures. In chapter 8, Weidner examines the expansion of Chinese oil
extraction into the global South and how the patterns of human rights
abuses, labor injustices, and ecological destruction have varied across
regions. She maintains that the practices of operators in all parts of the
world are below acceptable standards, but fi nds that the presence and
impact of transnational networks in Latin America have resulted in the
formation of standards that all operators are required to meet. In con-
trast, the advocacy vacuum in Africa and Asia, has few activists, NGOs,
scholars or journalists monitoring, challenging, and calling attention to
the practices of operators. This has resulted in Chinese fi rms being able
to employ a lower standard of environmental protection measures.
In chapter 9, Alkon also contributes to the argument that transna-
tional mobilization can affect change through her assessment of the
effects of the Green Revolution and subsequent World Bank and Inter-
national Monetary Fund policies of demand privatization in Latin
America. Drawing on cases of Cuban organic and low-input agriculture
and the Brazilian city of Belo Horizonte's declaration of food as a human
right, Alkon demonstrates that some national and local governments
have countered the domination of market-driven forms of agriculture by
increasing food access and local control of the food system. She contin-
ues, using the demands for “food sovereignty” among organizations such
as Brazil's Landless Workers Movement and movements such as La Via
Campesina , to demonstrate the impacts of structural adjustment and to
illustrate ways the U.S. food justice movement can strengthen its opposi-
tion to existing policies by drawing on transnational network ties to
expand the movement globally.
In chapter 10, Hicks expands on discussions of transnational net-
works by showing that there are times when local groups trying to
address undesired corporate practices and unwanted land uses need to
bypass the state to achieve equitable outcomes. Using examples of mining
disputes in Bulgaria, she suggests that in countries with weak norms of
participation and inconsistencies in the rule of law, local groups are more
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