Environmental Sociology - Essay Example

Katherine Maloy. SOCI 206 Final Paper April 30, Climate change and global warming are pressing controversial issues in the world today. This is in view of the increase in media coverage both on television and online every day. Secondly, the 2012 presidential election campaigns emphasize the global warming debate. While climate patterns and change are hardly a new concern, the public has only relatively recently begun expressing a mass interest in the issue. Fortunately, conservation efforts have been increasing in recent years, and people worldwide are making efforts to slow global warming and reverse the effects of hundreds of years of pollution. However, climate change is inevitable, and we must prepare for the effects that it will have on the world. It is crucial to look at what areas of the world will face extreme effects of global warming. More importantly, however, we must examine the affected parties. Through this paper, I will examine categories of people affected by global warming based on different factors, such as location and socioeconomic status. I will attempt to prove that individuals from a lower socioeconomic class are the most negatively affected by climate change. To illustrate this argument, I will examine several natural disasters (resulting from global warming) and environmental tragedies that have happened over the course of history. My Focus is on the extent of the effects of these disasters on the victims. Examples of these events include the chemical leak at the pesticide plant in Bhopal in 1984, and Hurricane Katrina, which tore through New Orleans in 2005. Secondly, I will examine the areas of the world that predicted to face the full wrath of global warming, and try to uncover why this is and the ultimate effect on the human population of these locations. The relevance of this topic to the course ties to several topics discussed over the semester. The most relevant topics were “Body and Health,” as discussed by Michael Bell in An Invitation to Environmental Sociology and “Sustaining the Environment,” by Philip Sutton. In his chapter, Bell talks about the chemical plant leak that I will discuss, among many other environmental accidents. He discusses the idea of the “invironment,” (Bell 130) and how all environmental issues, including global warming, have negative implications on the lives of individuals. Sutton’s chapter on sustaining the environment explores how human actions contribute global warming. Sutton also explores the long term effects of unmitigated pollution (a human activity). Both of these chapters feature as guiding principles in this paper. The first environmental incident to be considered is the chemical plant leak in India. The accident happened on December 2, 1984 in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, India (Bell 124). This plant primarily produced the insecticide Sevin, made with methyl isocyanate, which is highly reactive with water. One would imagine that a plant of this kind would be in an isolated area, surely far away from where people live. However, there was a neighborhood a few yards away from the factory with chemical leak (Bell 126). Because of a series of unfortunate events, there was a methyl isocyanate leak not reported until several hours after it occurred. At that point, however, it was way too late. Thousands of people immediately died from the chemicals released into the air. In the years that followed, thousands more would die while others suffer from complications such as cancer. Death toll estimates vary dramatically, and while the Indian government claims that 3500 people died, activists argue that the actual number of deaths is closer to 25000 (Bell 125). Regardless of the actual number, the figures are staggering, even more so when the amount of people suffering from secondary effects increases by the numbers. Victims have reported living with cancer, respiratory problems, and a variety of neurological and reproductive disorders. For this paper, it is essential to examine who was most affected by this disaster and why. Bell states that: “…the residents of the worst affected areas were not people whose troubles the local government pays much attention to or who take their troubles (including the dead) to the government for help (124).” In short, the government did not concern itself with the well-being of the individuals in the neighborhoods surrounding the plant because they were poor. Bhopal, the company who owned the plant obviously ignored the safety of the residents, because it did not take the necessary safety precautions to ensure that this leak did not happen, and victims are still struggling to get compensation for the damages the incident caused. An incident similar to that in India occurred in France in 2001. An explosion involving 300 tons of ammonium nitrate occurred at a fertilizer factory in Toulouse, in the southwest of France. Approximately 27000 homes in the nearby vicinity disintegrated (Bell 132). Fortunately, the death toll was lower than that resulting from the accident in India, with only 30 people dying, but over 2000 suffering injuries. Similar to the aforementioned incident, however, neither the corporation responsible nor the country’s government are taking responsibility or doing much to compensate the victims. According to Bell, “it is no simple accident of blind planning that the residential area closest to the plant is one of the poorest districts in Toulouse” (Bell 132) and that a housing project was just across the highway from the factory. While the aforementioned incidents were the result of human error and carelessness, it is essential to recognize that natural disasters often tend to more negatively affect the poor. Theoretically, one would think that natural disasters would not be able to discriminate. Consequently, there is a need to examine these disasters more carefully. The 2005 Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans left thousands of people homeless with close to two thousand dead. Joseph Kay in his article “Washington evades political responsibility for Katrina’s impacts” estimates that the aftermath left close to 100,000 poor people fended for themselves after the hurricane, in the wake of the government’s reluctance and blame games (13). This is beside the extensive damages caused n infrastructure and privately owned property. Aside from natural disasters, New Orleans is victim to man made situations such as pollution which degrade the health and environmental conditions of the area. Brym in his book “Sociology: Your Compass for a New World, the Brief Edition” describes environmental problems as socially defined and distributed (479). He further explores environmental racism, stating that: “…the advantaged often consciously put the disadvantaged in harms way to avoid risk themselves. For example, toxic dumps, garbage incinerators, and other environmentally dangerous installations are more likely to be built in poor communities…(Brym 479). ” The idea of knowingly endangering a fellow human being to safe guard another’s interests is a red buzzer on the ethical meter scale. However, the geographical positioning of most third world countries is not the doing of man and yet they (Africa and part of Asia) pay for the environmental transgressions of developed countries. The past few years have seen the increased death rates caused by climate change. Areas where floods and drought persist as a result of global warming are areas of segregation by default. This is to say that the areas lack in one way or the other. In summary, even in third world countries, the poor face alienation in what Brym refers to as environmental segregation. In 2011 drought hit the East African region affecting countries like Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia. According to a USAID report in Kenya alone, close to 3.5 million people were in danger of food insecurity. Of this 3.5 million, close to 10 % faced severe malnourishment or died due to starvation. Floods preceded the drought once again concentrating on areas that have socioeconomically underprivileged persons such as Budalangi and the Tana delta. Previously, in between 1997 – 1998, El-Nino floods claimed the lives of hundreds and destroyed property worth millions (McCarthy 507). These statistics do not measure up to the events of Hurricane Katrina or the chemical leak in India. The purpose of citing these events is to strike a comparison between those affected by calamities in the third world and the first world countries. The drought primarily affected northern Kenya, where a majority of the population, falls below the poverty line. Secondly, the inhabitants of Northern Kenya account for the minority among the 42 tribes. A comparison between the third world countries (Kenya) and the first world countries (America) yields a few notable facts. First, disaster has a tendency to strike socioeconomically underprivileged areas for instance, the gulf coast in America and the Northern Province in Kenya. Secondly, persons who inhabit this calamity stricken areas area a minority, Blacks and Hispanics in America while, in Kenya, it is the pastoralist communities. Thirdly, the government’s response to both situations is almost similar. It involves a lot of finger pointing and half hearted commitments. For disasters resulting from human error, the similarities are equally alarming. A comparison between the third world countries (India) and the first world countries (France) again supports this fact. Both accidents occurred in the poorest districts, and the government shows reluctance to mitigate the situation. The recent floods and drought across the third world countries, the heat waves, experienced in Europe, and extreme cold conditions in the Americas in the recent years are just but a sample of the real impact of global warming. MacDonald in his book “Third World Health: Hostage to First World Health” estimates that the current levels of Co2 in the world exceed the pre-ice age levels, approximately 55 million years ago. Experts estimate that temperatures will increase by 1.50C – 4.50C by mid 21st century. The sea level will up 8 -24cm depending on the region and drought and floods will double their effects by the year 2030 (Marien 62). These effects worsen because of the increase in population, rapid industrial expansion and poor environmental policies by governments (Maslin 68). These are all results of direct or indirect human actions. In the face of global warming, third world countries stand to lose the most. Developing countries (third world countries) do not have capable resources or technologies to abet the effects of the rising sea levels and insistent droughts. For these countries to curb these effects, it is imperative that they build their economies and advance their industrial technologies. However, this process will further aggravate the effects of global warming as it relies on manufacturing and use of fossil fuels that are costly and environmentally unfriendly (MacDonald 29). The controversy does not end there; the question of whether developed countries are considerate enough to cut down on their global warming activities is as such, just a question with no answer. Environmental sociology delves in the study of social factors that result to environmental problems. As mentioned above, global warming is mainly a result of the actions and omissions of humans. The subject also examines the societal impacts of these problems in a bid to solve them. This aspect of the subject has led to focus on renewable, non pollutant energy to substitute fossil fuels. In so doing, there is considerable focus on the social process that result in environmental problems or mitigate environmental problems. In light of this, the poor and underprivileged again forcefully carry the burden of adopting reforms at the expense of development. Environmental Sociology as a discipline, therefore, relies on the ontological status of environmental problems. Charles Darwin alluded to environmental segregation through natural selection (Sutton 25). Natural selection, in relation to survival, in the natural environment, reflects on the importance of social characteristics (Sutton 26). Social characteristics in modern times encompass race or ethnicity, wealth, historical back ground and political affiliations. While Darwin’s focus was on biologically heritable traits, one cannot rule out the heritability of wealth and political affiliations as these two clearly “run in the family”. With this claims, one can conclusively postulate that the environmental segregation of the poor and minorities is a form of natural selection. The difference between natural selection and environmental segregation is that in the world today the selection it is conscious and systematic hence loosing the aspect of natural. Some of the sociological theories that inevitably need inclusion in the environmental sociology discipline include the class theory by Karl Marx (Sutton 47). This theory identifies exploiters and the exploited and their coerced relationship. Capitalism is the principal ideology in both poor and rich countries. In America, Capitalists have deeper, wider spread roots than in other countries of the world. Marx argues that the class of an individual shapes their ability to orient and choose their collective fate. Granted, this segregation emerged from the primitive history of humans and evolved to capitalism. Capitalism in a sense does mot merely refers to the economic structuring of an entity. This ideology extends to distribution of resources including habitats and environmental disasters (DeSena 116 & Nightingale 423). Combine this with Darwin’s theory and one finds the appropriate position to describe the prejudices afforded by calamities around the world. Wealthy people have the ability to determine their social status and habitat. Ergo, the wealthy will be responsible for construction of hazardous industries, for instance, in underprivileged areas (DeSena 116 & Nightingale 423). The wealthy have the ability to chose where to reside while the poor do with what their pockets can afford. In which case, the affordable areas are geographically unsafe. Wealthy people are more politically affluent than poor people thus in times of crisis the plights of the wealthy have more impact on a government than the plights of the poor. For global warming, the situation is as mentioned, favorable to the technologically advanced wealthy areas. Suggesting environmental Marxism to mitigate these discrepancies, borders insanity. However, the danger global warming poses both to the privilege and the poor is real. Therefore, a procedure to protect the environmentally underprivileged in society is imperative. Specialists suggest a safe house, strong enough to withstand the impacts of hurricanes to be set up in New Orleans. This safe house will cater only for the old, sick and those incapable of relocating. Nonetheless, this does not change the fact that a majority of New Orleans residents remain poor people from minority groups. As for planning in relation to allocation of industries and factories, this is squarely in the government’s docket. The government gives prior warning of a looming emergency, but this is not enough. I argue from this perspective because, people are aware of global warming all around the world, but the effects still come as a shock to many (Maslin 69). This is true for countries that lack the capacity to mitigate these effects. Perhaps in place of environmental Marxism, nations should adopt a humanitarian perspective, therefore, seeing victims of disasters resulting from global warming and human error not necessarily as equals but as humans. Works Cited Bell, Michael Mayerfeld. An Invitation to Environmental Sociology. New York: Pine Forge Press, 2011. DeSena, Judith. The World in Brooklyn. New York: Lexington Books, 2012. Kay, Joseph. Hurricane Katrina: Social Consequences and Political Lessons. New York: Mehring Books, 2005. MacDonald, Théodore Harney. Third World Health: Hostage to First World Health. New York: Radcliffe Publishing, 2005. Marien, Michael. Future Survey Annual 1992. New York: Transaction Publishers, 1993. Maslin, Mark. Global Warming. New York: MBI Publishing Company, 2007. McCarthy, James J. Climate Change 2001. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Nightingale, Carl. Segregation: A Global History of Divided Cities. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2012. Brym, Robert J. Sociology: Your Compass for a New World, the Brief Edition. New York: Cengage Learning, 2009. Sutton, Philip W. The Environment: A Sociological Introduction. New York: Polity, 2007. Read More