1.1 Framing nature using language tools By framing, I mean the structures and pre-assumptions that we consciously or unconsciously apply to a situation in order to make sense of it. So are there any differences between the way in which we frame nature in caring for environment and the way in which we frame it to provide accountability? What significance might this have, and what tools might be used to bridge the responsibilities of caring and accountability? Caring for environment makes manifest the informal aspects of
Learning outcomes After studying this course, you should be able to: understand why systems thinking might be useful and know something about how it can be applied in the context of environmental responsibility describe the significance of environmental pragmatism and cognitive justice as tools for supporting environmental policy and action.
References 1.4.4 Summary The question of who is responsible for factory sweatshops in the poorer regions of the globe remains a passionate political issue, in North America and beyond. Views on how responsibility for overseas sweatshops should be exercised differ between those who believe that it should be left to market forces to improve conditions and those who consider that everyone, as a consumer, bears some responsibility for their perpetuation and should intervene to bring abo 1.4.3 It's all down to connections For Iris Marion Young, the responsibility of those in North America and Europe towards distant others does indeed rest with their connections to injustices elsewhere, but it would be a mistake to stretch this line of reasoning too far. Although these connections, whether as a consumer, boardroom executive or shop manager, can establish a line of responsibility, as was claimed in Section 3.1, for Young this is only the starting point and not the end point of our involvement. We do not have to Acknowledgements Grateful acknowledgement is made to the following sources for permission to reproduce material in this unit: Chapter 9: Andrew Light, ‘Contemporary Environmental Ethics from Meta-ethics to Public Philosophy’, in Metaphilosophy, 33(4), 2002, 426-49. Reproduced by permission of the author Chapter 10: Eric Higgs, ‘The Two-Culture Problem: Ecological Restoration and the Integration of Knowledge’, in Restoration Ecology, 13(1), 2005, 15 1.3.6 Activity 4 Nike drew up its code of conduct, as I have indicated, to meet its own concerns. Cast your eye down the checklist in Extract 2 and give yourself time to consider what issues might have been added if the code 1.3.5 Corporate connections As I mentioned in Section 2, what was happening in the factories of overseas contractors was said to have appeared remote to most, if not all, the chief executive officers of the clothing multinationals in the 1980s. Overseas contractors were selected on the basis of market price, quality and reliability, not on whether forced or child labour happened to be employed to stitch the product together. However, all that changed in the early 1990s when the geographical ties between the big retailer 1.2.7 In praise of cheap offshore labour? Claims over the benefits of globalisation and the exploitation of cheap offshore labour generate strong feelings and, not surprisingly, divide opinion between those who favour the global marketplace and its detractors. The issue turns on whether the constant search for ever-cheaper manufacturing and service locations is seen as a good or a bad thing. It may appear odd, at first, to suggest that exploiting the poor of another country can, on any measure, be regarded as a good thing, but 1.2.6 Defining global markets Global markets for manufactured goods, as opposed to, say, primary commodities such as oil and timber, arose largely in the second half of the twentieth century as trade between countries intensified. The lowering of transport costs and the relative fall in trade barriers enabled firms in one country to compete with a domestic rival in another. The supply of manufactured goods across the globe as a result of worldwide demand, principally from the affluent economies, thus heightened competitio 1.2.5 Offshore fragments of industry: a pro-market standpoint From a pro-market standpoint, global market forces and the competitive pressures that they generate leave businesses with no choice but to take advantage of lower labour costs elsewhere. In the textile business or the toy business, lower wage costs are the key to profitability; if your competitors find a cheaper labour source, you either follow their example or go out of business. It is not, so the argument runs, because managers lack integrity or compassion that there are now more manufactur 1.2.4 Offshore fragments of industry: the negative standpoint Nike Inc., the US sportswear firm, did in fact take the lead in organising its overseas manufacturing business on a subcontracting basis (Donaghu and Barff, 1990). Early on in the 1970s, it established a web of contractual relationships (or partnerships, as it preferred to call them), with factories in Taiwan and South Korea, to produce its branded footwear. Of these factories, the big-volume producers among them were also contracted to other Western firms to produce a range of footwear. Nike 1.2.3 Activity 2 Before you read on, I would like you to dwell for just a moment on the significance of this shift from direct investment by Western firms to the establishment of subcontracting ties with overseas partners. Aside from outside firms being able to pa 1.2.2 Offshore fragments of industry The rise of global factories in the 1970s owed much to the rapid improvement in transport and communications technologies which took place at that time and which made it possible to keep in touch with, and control, production processes in different parts of the world. Just as significant was the fragmentation of industrial production whereby parts of the manufacturing process could be relocated over vast distances. Sewing in garment and footwear production, for instance, was among the 1.1.3 Introduction continued The difficulty perhaps is that things which happen at some distance from the everyday routine of our lives are often hard to place or connect with. Moreover, it has to be said that not everyone views factory sweatshops in quite the same way as groups such as Oxfam, or indeed endorses their negative claims about the use of cheap labour in places such as East Asia. For that is what the statements of such groups are: claims. And they are far from uncontroversial. In fact, it is poss 1.1.2 Activity 1 You have already glanced at Figure 1 and some o 7.1 Climate models To understand climate change it is necessary to construct climate models, to explore and predict interactions between different factors. Models are tested for accuracy against known sets of data, before being run forward to predict future changes. 5.5 Emergency planning as an organisational management function If emergency services' EPOs plan to respond to other people's emergencies, people managing a business activity with major incident potential have a different perspective. They have to respond to emergencies within their own organisation. In effect, if an incident occurs, the organisation is itself in a crisis, with functionality impaired. All of this comes into the corporate governance area and the implications of internal control. This requires companies to ensure that they have a sound syst 5.3 Emergency planning as a formal requirement Several pieces of legislation make the preparation of emergency plans a statutory requirement. The European Directive on the control of major accident hazards (Council of the European Union, 1996a), the ‘Seveso II Directive’, outlines the planning requirements for industrial sites with large inventories of hazardous substances. In the UK, the requirements of this directive have been incorporated into the Control of Major Accident Hazards Regulations (Health and Safety Executive, 1999a). I 4.1 Introduction Annual costs to employers from accidental injury and occupational illness are on the order of 5–10 per cent of the gross profits of UK industry. The total social cost, including the cost of benefits and National Health hospitalisation and treatment, make this a truly staggering drain on the nation's coffers!
Activity 4
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