I just came across this site, thought I'd share:
http://www.vegetablecruelty.com/
the photo gallery is particularly interesting!
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Futurism In China
I was reading an article that made me think about futurism and its implications. China has become the leader in sustainable technology despite being the worlds biggest producer of green house gases. They have made bigger and cheaper wind turbines than the U.S. has, and they are the worlds largest producer and consumer of solar energy panels. Their government supports research that is usually left to the free markets here. This allows for riskier and more innovative technology research. Also the government is able to implement energy saving programs quickly among their population since they have the bureaucracy to handle such situations (because they are commies.)
This made me think that if I was Chinese, I might believe technology will solve the problems of the future. It already has created the Chinese middle class which some say have it better then our middle class in terms of quality of life. And futurology or not, it seems to me that clean energy technology is going to be central to saving the planet. This does not mean we should blindly have faith in technology without actually knowing what that technology will do. It simply means that any intelligent person has to realize in order to have a future we need to use scientific innovation (along with behavioral changes) to take the existing polluting technology we have and alter it or remove it in a way that is sustainable. Technology is the problem, but it also has to be part of the solution. Sometimes I feel we are all doomed and other times I think maybe there is hope for turning back the destructive tide of human progress. I like some of the things the Chinese are doing even if they still have a long way to go. At this point momentum is on their side and I predict that they will be tasked with creating a model for being a sustainable nation. So here is to the future, may it be better then the past. Happy New Year and holiday.
Chris W
This made me think that if I was Chinese, I might believe technology will solve the problems of the future. It already has created the Chinese middle class which some say have it better then our middle class in terms of quality of life. And futurology or not, it seems to me that clean energy technology is going to be central to saving the planet. This does not mean we should blindly have faith in technology without actually knowing what that technology will do. It simply means that any intelligent person has to realize in order to have a future we need to use scientific innovation (along with behavioral changes) to take the existing polluting technology we have and alter it or remove it in a way that is sustainable. Technology is the problem, but it also has to be part of the solution. Sometimes I feel we are all doomed and other times I think maybe there is hope for turning back the destructive tide of human progress. I like some of the things the Chinese are doing even if they still have a long way to go. At this point momentum is on their side and I predict that they will be tasked with creating a model for being a sustainable nation. So here is to the future, may it be better then the past. Happy New Year and holiday.
Chris W
Hope!
Hello all,
I realize that most people aren't checking the blog anymore but I saw this on a friend's fb wall and I thought that only this group of people would understand how exciting it is! Jühnde is a tiny village in Germany that is living an almost completely sustainable lifestyle. It seems an Eco-village par excellence. My primary worry is the tractor... is that run on biofuel too? Most of their emissions and energy come from biofuel and woodchips... are they cutting down forests? How much do people drive in the town? Even so, it is very exciting that it exists even if it seems highly dependent upon local trust.
I realize that most people aren't checking the blog anymore but I saw this on a friend's fb wall and I thought that only this group of people would understand how exciting it is! Jühnde is a tiny village in Germany that is living an almost completely sustainable lifestyle. It seems an Eco-village par excellence. My primary worry is the tractor... is that run on biofuel too? Most of their emissions and energy come from biofuel and woodchips... are they cutting down forests? How much do people drive in the town? Even so, it is very exciting that it exists even if it seems highly dependent upon local trust.
Friday, December 18, 2009
Thursday, December 17, 2009
EcoTechnofuturistic Webcomics...
Hey everyone. I am near delirious and finals end with a bang for me tomorrow at 330. Phew.
Anyway, a couple weeks ago, I was talking to Dale about an amazing webcomic called Dresden Codak, done by the great and amazing Aaron Diaz. Anyway, check out HOB, a beautiful, futuristic piece outlining an association between computer and nature, or any of his standalones (Onald Creely is my favorite). It's weird. I love.
http://dresdencodak.com/
Direct link to the HOB plotline: http://dresdencodak.com/2007/02/08/pom/
Have a good break, all. Happy graduation to some, see the rest of you after the break.
Anyway, a couple weeks ago, I was talking to Dale about an amazing webcomic called Dresden Codak, done by the great and amazing Aaron Diaz. Anyway, check out HOB, a beautiful, futuristic piece outlining an association between computer and nature, or any of his standalones (Onald Creely is my favorite). It's weird. I love.
http://dresdencodak.com/
Direct link to the HOB plotline: http://dresdencodak.com/2007/02/08/pom/
Have a good break, all. Happy graduation to some, see the rest of you after the break.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Precis: The Decay of Lying
Oscar Wilde’s “The Decay of Lying” attempts to throw preconceived notions of Art, Life, and Nature upside down. Wilde continually comes back to the idea that Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life. Everything in the world that we experience is linked to a previous thought or image that our minds recognize and immediately compare to. Wilde feels that our experiences are becoming dull and stagnant. Art is a medium used to inspire and create new things, and most importantly, to shape Life. Wilde calls for a return to lying because lying is pure fantasy and is crucial in the development of Art and artistic expression through Life.
Realism and Impressionism are denounced and presented as attempts to manipulate and mold by mimicking and altering what is real. The problem for Wilde is that once we accept something as being real, the formulation of that thing has already been understood as unchanging. We can only mimic things that are constant. For Wilde, the creation of the real relies completely on the inventions of Art. Art allows our imaginations to create the realities that human nature seeks to fulfill. An example is given as to how a sunset was never a sunset before it was painted. It was simply an experience that each person had, visually. After the sunset was painted, it was shown in exquisite fashion, as perfection. Our idea of what a sunset ought to be is forever engrained in our minds when we see a natural sunset. We compare the colors of the clouds and of the sky to a certain artist who employed those colors in his creation of a “sunset.”
The character of people is determined by Art as well. Writers have created characters to build their work of Art in the form of fiction. People strive to maintain their own identities by latching on to those identities created by fiction. Fiction becomes much more like fact, and writers attempting to capture fact seem only to be able to create fiction. These writers are attempting to capture what is, what happened, and what was, but only succeed in replicating those circumstances. Elements of the event are written in forms that were created by artists and in trying to describe the real, the author creates his story. What is already present in the real cannot be mimicked and considered artistic.
Nature is said to be crude, monotonous, unfinished and lacking design. What is in nature is already there and Art cannot become of nature as a result. Art is new. Wilde tells of poets who wrote about and were inspired by nature. Their poetry is not considered beautiful because it tells of natures beauty, it is beautiful because the author brought the skill of poetry to writing about nature. Wilde says “people only discover in nature what they bring to her. She has no suggestions of her own.” Nature is a creation of humans. All that exists as nature is only thought to be such because we invented it. “For what is Nature? Nature is no great mother who has borne us. She is our creation.”
Wilde describes nature as stagnant and boring. His description is a result of his characterization of Art and Life. Nature is boring because it simply “is.” Our conceptions of beauty in nature are creations. Nature is depicted in ways to mirror what actually exists. A painting of a mountain is designed to show what the mountain looks like, but this is not Art. A fanciful interpretation of a mountain with striking faces and glittering snow with gleaming skies and the greenest trees is a lie that attempts to show what nature should be. Our interactions with nature rely on artistic renderings of the surroundings that are supposed to be untouched. It is in this way that Nature is always boring, always falling short of artistic expectation. Nature never influences our interpretation of the world, our interpretations of the world through the experiences of Art, shape Nature.
It seems as though Nature is lie according to Wilde. But this lie does not seem to be the lie that he is striving toward in the beginning of his writing. Nature is a creation, but it is not created because of the influences of Art. The lie of Nature does not contribute to the formulation of the multiple beauties that Wilde says Art inspires to create. Instead, the lie of Nature is a result of people imitating and replicating life. This inartistic approach creates a worshiping of Nature as something other than what it really is. Nature becomes a reproduction of the visible objects found within it. Nature cannot be mimicked because life imitates Art and Nature is not Art. Nature is the imitation of Life. Still, it remains unclear when Nature is a creation of the human mind whether or not this constitutes as a lie similar to that described by Wilde? If Nature is a creation, it does not reflect the real, and is a lie. Then is the lie of Nature not preserving the artistic mode of creation Wilde is begging for? Nature cannot be mimicked because life imitates Art and Nature is not Art. Nature is the imitation of Life.
Realism and Impressionism are denounced and presented as attempts to manipulate and mold by mimicking and altering what is real. The problem for Wilde is that once we accept something as being real, the formulation of that thing has already been understood as unchanging. We can only mimic things that are constant. For Wilde, the creation of the real relies completely on the inventions of Art. Art allows our imaginations to create the realities that human nature seeks to fulfill. An example is given as to how a sunset was never a sunset before it was painted. It was simply an experience that each person had, visually. After the sunset was painted, it was shown in exquisite fashion, as perfection. Our idea of what a sunset ought to be is forever engrained in our minds when we see a natural sunset. We compare the colors of the clouds and of the sky to a certain artist who employed those colors in his creation of a “sunset.”
The character of people is determined by Art as well. Writers have created characters to build their work of Art in the form of fiction. People strive to maintain their own identities by latching on to those identities created by fiction. Fiction becomes much more like fact, and writers attempting to capture fact seem only to be able to create fiction. These writers are attempting to capture what is, what happened, and what was, but only succeed in replicating those circumstances. Elements of the event are written in forms that were created by artists and in trying to describe the real, the author creates his story. What is already present in the real cannot be mimicked and considered artistic.
Nature is said to be crude, monotonous, unfinished and lacking design. What is in nature is already there and Art cannot become of nature as a result. Art is new. Wilde tells of poets who wrote about and were inspired by nature. Their poetry is not considered beautiful because it tells of natures beauty, it is beautiful because the author brought the skill of poetry to writing about nature. Wilde says “people only discover in nature what they bring to her. She has no suggestions of her own.” Nature is a creation of humans. All that exists as nature is only thought to be such because we invented it. “For what is Nature? Nature is no great mother who has borne us. She is our creation.”
Wilde describes nature as stagnant and boring. His description is a result of his characterization of Art and Life. Nature is boring because it simply “is.” Our conceptions of beauty in nature are creations. Nature is depicted in ways to mirror what actually exists. A painting of a mountain is designed to show what the mountain looks like, but this is not Art. A fanciful interpretation of a mountain with striking faces and glittering snow with gleaming skies and the greenest trees is a lie that attempts to show what nature should be. Our interactions with nature rely on artistic renderings of the surroundings that are supposed to be untouched. It is in this way that Nature is always boring, always falling short of artistic expectation. Nature never influences our interpretation of the world, our interpretations of the world through the experiences of Art, shape Nature.
It seems as though Nature is lie according to Wilde. But this lie does not seem to be the lie that he is striving toward in the beginning of his writing. Nature is a creation, but it is not created because of the influences of Art. The lie of Nature does not contribute to the formulation of the multiple beauties that Wilde says Art inspires to create. Instead, the lie of Nature is a result of people imitating and replicating life. This inartistic approach creates a worshiping of Nature as something other than what it really is. Nature becomes a reproduction of the visible objects found within it. Nature cannot be mimicked because life imitates Art and Nature is not Art. Nature is the imitation of Life. Still, it remains unclear when Nature is a creation of the human mind whether or not this constitutes as a lie similar to that described by Wilde? If Nature is a creation, it does not reflect the real, and is a lie. Then is the lie of Nature not preserving the artistic mode of creation Wilde is begging for? Nature cannot be mimicked because life imitates Art and Nature is not Art. Nature is the imitation of Life.
bernake man of the year!?!?!?! who would you pick?
Not that I every had respect for Time Magazine but their decision to make Bernake of the year is a a cruel, sick, sad joke for all of us who can't find jobs or lost health care due to not having jobs or having to resort to dangerous black market jobs to finance their public education. And the millions and billions around the world that we know suffer because of our economic system and insatiable demand for Starbucks sugarfree nonfat decaf lattes.
Even more of joke then Obama nearly simultaneous troop deployment/acceptance of the Nobel PEACE price. There's goes my pride to brandish that blue passport. Even that men's magazine that picked the fictional character of Don Draper from Mad Men did a better job than Time.
Anyways, who would I choose for Person of the Year? Well if it was from the traditional applicant pool...what about Micheal Jackson? Or Hugo Chavez. Or the female head of Liberia Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf or that born again christian guy that controls the human genome project. Who would you all pick?
Even more of joke then Obama nearly simultaneous troop deployment/acceptance of the Nobel PEACE price. There's goes my pride to brandish that blue passport. Even that men's magazine that picked the fictional character of Don Draper from Mad Men did a better job than Time.
Anyways, who would I choose for Person of the Year? Well if it was from the traditional applicant pool...what about Micheal Jackson? Or Hugo Chavez. Or the female head of Liberia Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf or that born again christian guy that controls the human genome project. Who would you all pick?
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Obama gets real p2p on retrofits
First off, hope you guys all got through the final. Maybe it was the hours....that i spent staring at some of more dire terms of the course but this seems reductive and vaguely mocking:
Before going off to Copenhagen this week, Obama stopped at a Home Depot in Northern Virignia to talk about home retrofits. Obama strikes a light-hearted and comedic tone in making his argument for the power of retrofits. Did he spend all his soaring rhetoric last week in Norway, or is this Obama's message for changing national behavior? He is really selling it here:
"Insulation is sexy"
"What would you do if you saw twenty dollar bills floating out your window?"
PRECIS: Minority Communities Need More Parks
PRECIS: Minority Communities Need More Parks
(Reading scheduled for Thur. Oct 8)
The article “Minority Communities Need More Parks, Report Says” was written by Angela Rowen and published in The Berkeley Daily Planet. This article addresses a local issue that is particularly relevant to larger discussions of environmental justice and social ecology, as well as the idea of ecoracism. Rowen central focus is Paul Kibel’s report, “Access to Parkland: Environmental Justice at East Bay Parks,” directed at the East Bay Regional Park District. Kibel reviews published and unpublished reports to determine information about usage and access to EBRPD’s holdings and determines that a clear pattern emerges from this data.
According to Kibel, the majority of the district’s 100,000 acres is geographically situated in hillside areas which are next to wealthy, white communities. The low-income flatlands of cities like Oakland, Richmond, Berkeley, Hayward, and Fremont have a much farther proximity to parks than their hillside counterparts. These flatlands are also home to most of the district’s minority neighborhoods. Proximity to parks greatly increases park access; “Kibel argues that because people are more likely to visit parks near their own communities, the district’s historic focus on acquiring large tracts of land in the highlands has created disparities in park usage based on income and, by extension, race.” He hopes “his study will highlight the importance of the availability of open space in the fight for environmental justice, which has largely focused on toxics issues.”
This issue is one of both social justice and ecology, and thus one of environmental justice, because it is believed that parks provide the public with health benefits from recreation, therapeutic benefits from the natural setting, and “consensus for broader environmental policies.” Although I personally agree with the belief that certain park systems provide this final benefit of broadening support of environmentalism, I am skeptical as too the validity and/or directness of this causal claim for all parklands for two reasons. Firstly, there is an immense difference between the “nature” encountered in small urban parks and the “nature” encountered in the expansive, long-standing state and national parks. Secondly, an appreciation for nature’s physical beauty does not necessarily translate to awareness and understanding of global or even local environmental problems. Although I do not contest the value of urban parks, I question his implication that creating new urban parks will directly result in broadened support for environmentalism.
Subsequently, Kibel offers several solutions in his report, although his expressed intention is to “start a conversation about the issue, rather than assess blame or accuse any individuals or groups of environmental racism.” This highlights an important distinction between environmental justice and ecoracism. In addition to outlining the arguments of Kibel and supporters, Rowan provides opposing points from prominent environmentalists, like the chair of the Sierra Club’s East Bay Public Lands Committee, Norman La Force. La Force commends the collaborative efforts of the state and regional park services, adding “that some of the problem of getting more open space in Richmond lies in the political will of African-American city council members, who he says have complained that there are too many parks in their neighborhoods.” Furthermore, he says that “it would have been more useful to examine the California State Parks agency, which wants to create more urban parks but can’t get the funding to do so.”
Additionally, Nancy Skinner, a park district board member who represents Ward 1, which includes Berkeley, San Pablo and Richmond. Skinner, critiques the article, conceding the historical trajectory of existing claims but argues recent aims have been toward acquisition of shoreline. Skinner also praises EBRPD for their instrumental role in passing Measure AA (“which set aside $60 million for city parks to acquire flatland and shoreline parks and develop programs to serve urban communities”). The article closes with Skinner’s reminder that another bond measure, on the November 2008 ballot “would provide for more money to city parks for acquisition of parklands and environmental education and outreach programs that target low-income people.”
Accordingly, I looked up this November 2008 ballot measure to see what it included and whether or not it passed. The measure authorizes East Bay Regional Park District “to issue up to $500 million in general obligation bonds, provided repayment projections, verified by independent auditors, demonstrate that property tax rates will not increase beyond present rates of $10 per year, per $100,000 of assessed valuation.” Measure WW, “Extend Existing East Bay Regional Park District Bond With No Increase In Tax Rate East Bay Regional Park District”, passed 72% yes to 28% no.
by: Whitney Paalborg
(Reading scheduled for Thur. Oct 8)
The article “Minority Communities Need More Parks, Report Says” was written by Angela Rowen and published in The Berkeley Daily Planet. This article addresses a local issue that is particularly relevant to larger discussions of environmental justice and social ecology, as well as the idea of ecoracism. Rowen central focus is Paul Kibel’s report, “Access to Parkland: Environmental Justice at East Bay Parks,” directed at the East Bay Regional Park District. Kibel reviews published and unpublished reports to determine information about usage and access to EBRPD’s holdings and determines that a clear pattern emerges from this data.
According to Kibel, the majority of the district’s 100,000 acres is geographically situated in hillside areas which are next to wealthy, white communities. The low-income flatlands of cities like Oakland, Richmond, Berkeley, Hayward, and Fremont have a much farther proximity to parks than their hillside counterparts. These flatlands are also home to most of the district’s minority neighborhoods. Proximity to parks greatly increases park access; “Kibel argues that because people are more likely to visit parks near their own communities, the district’s historic focus on acquiring large tracts of land in the highlands has created disparities in park usage based on income and, by extension, race.” He hopes “his study will highlight the importance of the availability of open space in the fight for environmental justice, which has largely focused on toxics issues.”
This issue is one of both social justice and ecology, and thus one of environmental justice, because it is believed that parks provide the public with health benefits from recreation, therapeutic benefits from the natural setting, and “consensus for broader environmental policies.” Although I personally agree with the belief that certain park systems provide this final benefit of broadening support of environmentalism, I am skeptical as too the validity and/or directness of this causal claim for all parklands for two reasons. Firstly, there is an immense difference between the “nature” encountered in small urban parks and the “nature” encountered in the expansive, long-standing state and national parks. Secondly, an appreciation for nature’s physical beauty does not necessarily translate to awareness and understanding of global or even local environmental problems. Although I do not contest the value of urban parks, I question his implication that creating new urban parks will directly result in broadened support for environmentalism.
Subsequently, Kibel offers several solutions in his report, although his expressed intention is to “start a conversation about the issue, rather than assess blame or accuse any individuals or groups of environmental racism.” This highlights an important distinction between environmental justice and ecoracism. In addition to outlining the arguments of Kibel and supporters, Rowan provides opposing points from prominent environmentalists, like the chair of the Sierra Club’s East Bay Public Lands Committee, Norman La Force. La Force commends the collaborative efforts of the state and regional park services, adding “that some of the problem of getting more open space in Richmond lies in the political will of African-American city council members, who he says have complained that there are too many parks in their neighborhoods.” Furthermore, he says that “it would have been more useful to examine the California State Parks agency, which wants to create more urban parks but can’t get the funding to do so.”
Additionally, Nancy Skinner, a park district board member who represents Ward 1, which includes Berkeley, San Pablo and Richmond. Skinner, critiques the article, conceding the historical trajectory of existing claims but argues recent aims have been toward acquisition of shoreline. Skinner also praises EBRPD for their instrumental role in passing Measure AA (“which set aside $60 million for city parks to acquire flatland and shoreline parks and develop programs to serve urban communities”). The article closes with Skinner’s reminder that another bond measure, on the November 2008 ballot “would provide for more money to city parks for acquisition of parklands and environmental education and outreach programs that target low-income people.”
Accordingly, I looked up this November 2008 ballot measure to see what it included and whether or not it passed. The measure authorizes East Bay Regional Park District “to issue up to $500 million in general obligation bonds, provided repayment projections, verified by independent auditors, demonstrate that property tax rates will not increase beyond present rates of $10 per year, per $100,000 of assessed valuation.” Measure WW, “Extend Existing East Bay Regional Park District Bond With No Increase In Tax Rate East Bay Regional Park District”, passed 72% yes to 28% no.
by: Whitney Paalborg
Monday, December 14, 2009
Interesting e-mails regarding last Friday
Hi all,
I promised a synthesis of Bob Meiser's arguments in "They pledge your tuition" but I got to busy to read through the close to 40 pages of text (total, it's broken up into 4 documents). So, if you are genuinely interested go to Save UC's "get educated" page. You will see them. It's an important issue to understand so if you've got some time over break I'd encourage you to check it out.
Also, this letter has been circling around today and I thought you all might be interested to in an analysis of the events that have occurred over the last few weeks, culminating in last Friday's violences. There is the analysis from a Prof in the Graduate School of Education (appears first), which is actually a response to an e-mail sent out by the Dean of the GSE (which is below the analysis). Just thought I'd share it.
I promised a synthesis of Bob Meiser's arguments in "They pledge your tuition" but I got to busy to read through the close to 40 pages of text (total, it's broken up into 4 documents). So, if you are genuinely interested go to Save UC's "get educated" page. You will see them. It's an important issue to understand so if you've got some time over break I'd encourage you to check it out.
Also, this letter has been circling around today and I thought you all might be interested to in an analysis of the events that have occurred over the last few weeks, culminating in last Friday's violences. There is the analysis from a Prof in the Graduate School of Education (appears first), which is actually a response to an e-mail sent out by the Dean of the GSE (which is below the analysis). Just thought I'd share it.
Dear David all the GSE colleagues,
While I genuinely appreciate David's message, I feel, somewhat guiltily, a
need to respond to it. Where I second David’s message is in the belief
that beyond any wider implications, acts of violence necessarily diminish
the university, discouraging the free exchange of ideas, which ought to be
our defining characteristic. Nevertheless questions of proportion and
degree matter. While all acts of violence diminish the university,
differences in how and how much they do so ought to influence our
responses. And these differences were obscured in David’s message.
With many people having little more than news reports of events at the
chancellor's residence on which to base their impressions, I realize that
my comments might seem to indicate a lack of common decency or at least an
incredibly bad sense of timing, but as I will try to explain, I believe
that the university administration not only set the stage for a violent
turn in protests by acts which have repeatedly raised tensions and
undermined belief in its good will, but actually engaged in most of the
violence that has occurred.
I write as someone who has been consistently critical of the Berkeley
administration, but also as someone who has worked for decades against
violence, and finally as perhaps the only person on this list who
witnessed any of Friday night's events. (I was writing letters of
recommendation in my Tolman Hall office, which faces the chancellor's
residence.)
In brief, at about 11 PM a group of protesters --lit by perhaps 10
torches- marched past Tolman and up to the chancellor's residence. They
sounded quite angry. I heard someone call out, "That's the chancellor's
house," and I remember at that time having the impression that it was said
as if people who did not recognize the chancellor's house and were not
focused on going there. The protesters did not, as the Chronicle reports
that police claimed, surround the residence, nor would it have been
possible for so few to do so. I heard, but did not see what must have
been the planters and window(s?) breaking and almost immediately saw the
protesters fleeing. There may have been police chasing them; I did not see
any. I could not tell if the protesters were fleeing because they did not
wish to be caught or because they did not want to participate in what they
now realized was an escalated form of violence. None of the protesters I
saw fleeing (and I believe I saw most of them) were carrying lit torches.
I did not see anyone arrested, but trees block my view of the front of the
chancellor's house, so I do not know if the arrests occurred at the time
or later, and whether because of their individual actions or because of
the actions of the group as a whole.
What I do know is that I witnessed enough at variance with university
officials’ accounts as reported in the press to make me suspicious of the
rest of those accounts, even if I had not already been made suspicious by
distortions and inaccuracies in previous administration statements about
recent protests, which have been amply documented elsewhere.
I believe that acts were committed at the chancellor's house that were not
only counter-productive but also, more important, wrong. And yet those
events were remarkably brief and perhaps spontaneous. Again, I do not
write this to be evasive but rather because even among what we condemn we
need to make judgments, and I believe that sustained, planned violence
demands a different response from that which did not and does not strike
me as sustained and possibly not even as planned. Moreover, it seems to
me that violence by those whose power confers legitimacy on its exercise
requires a stronger response than that by those who lack such power.
There should be a higher standard by which to judge the actions of police
and campus officials than of protesters, many of them –whether students or
not—youthful. (I would also characterize the actions by individual police
outside of Wheeler as brief and perhaps spontaneous. I do not by this
mean to excuse acts of police violence. It seems to me that police have a
professional responsibility to de-escalate a situation, and moreover
spontaneity does not excuse violence.)
The one group so far whose actions –both those that have fostered violence
and those that have constituted in themselves violence-- have been neither
brief nor spontaneous is the university administration. Against all kinds
of advice from a range of campus figures, the university administration
has consistently escalated rather than tried to reach out. The decision
to leave it to police to deal with the Wheeler occupation on Nov. 20, to
close the building, to not meet with protesters, to block faculty from
trying to mediate an end to the protest, and to charge the first arrested
protesters with felonies (with felonies (!) for staging a sit-in in two
Wheeler classrooms), the decision to surround Wheeler Hall with riot
police, all reflected decisions made by administrators who had amply time
to do otherwise. The distorted, unsympathetic statements released by
campus leaders days after the protest again followed deliberation and
caused real trauma to many students, including GSE students who described
a seemingly unbridgeable gap coming to separate them from a university
they had loved. And then Friday morning, directly leading up to the
incident at the chancellor’s residence, the arrest and detention of the
students in Wheeler despite what appears to be police permission to be
there and the failure to give a dispersal order, the decision to detain
students at Santa Rita jail (an act the ACLU is investigating as a
possible violation of student’s constitutional rights), was, by its own
admission, a choice the administration made not in the heat of the moment
but after careful planning. (The Friday morning arrests in Wheeler Hall
ended a week-long protest during which academic activities continued
largely uninterrupted. During the week, students had been told by police
that they would be given the opportunity to disperse before police began
making arrests. Students came and went. Early Friday morning police
entered Wheeler and without warning began arresting sleeping students.
The administration has explained that faculty could not be called in as
mediators because it might have undermined the secrecy of the arrest
operation. Because students had their computers and other study materials
confiscated and then were detained for many hours far from campus, they
were put at risk of academic failure. And so, the campus’s senior
academic leaders now appear to many students dishonest enemies of their
education. This premeditated action by campus leaders that did students
real harm does not excuse any violence at the president’s house, but it
does suggest a need to place violence that might have occurred there in
its context.
If the university curriculum is to include contentious public matters,
peaceful protest is not antithetical to their exchange but a crucial
component of it. And on no campus has the history of protest done more to
extend the range of ideas exchanged in classrooms than Berkeley. It is
thus all the more discouraging that campus officials have so consistently
escalated tensions and repressed protest rather than seeking a dialogue
with protesters. Repudiating the role of campus leaders in violence does
not absolve protesters of responsibility for their actions, but to avoid
challenging the central role of campus leaders precludes any meaningful
dialogue.
Finally, I started this note because I thought that David’s appeal to
invocations of shared campus values rings increasingly hollow. But David,
to his credit, has at least spoken out. It is discouraging how few
faculty have done so. If shared governance is to mean anything beyond its
formal mechanisms, faculty have an obligation to speak up about
administrative violence that inevitably bears our imprimateur.
Dan
Campus administrator’s harsh treatment of protesters undermines
--------
(From the Dean of the School of Education)
> GSE colleagues (students, staff, and faculty,
>
> I have been struggling to find the words to convey to our GSE community
> the range of conflicting emotions that I have felt over the past few weeks
> as events have ranged from the sublime to the outrageous. My responses
> have ranged from pride (in the way our GSE and other students acquitted
> themselves in the initial protests in November), to bewilderment (at the
> reaction of our campus leadership to the initial Wheeler occupation) to
> concern (about whether the peaceful equilibrium in the Open University
> sessions could be maintained) to helplessness (with the arrests on Friday
> morning) to outrage (at the violence that placed the Birgeneaus in harm's
> way late Friday night next door at University House). You are all, I am
> sure, equally conflicted as the events push and pull us in different
> directions.
>
> I was searching for a way to say that we must maintain some key
> principles, such as respect for all sorts of differences (including
> intellectual and moral issues, the right and responsibility for all of us
> to express our views in dialogue or even debate, the importance of
> resisting the impulses to violence. Then Catherine Cole shared these
> principles, officially adopted by our campus, and available on our
> Berkeley website, with the Faculty Forum. They say what I was trying to
> say, much more eloquently than I. Let's continue to debate the issues
> vigorously, respectfully, and peacefully.
>
> Yours in defense of fairness, respect, dissent, and peace,
>
> David
>
>
> PRINCIPLES OF COMMUNITY (http://berkeley.edu/about/principles.shtm)
>
> These principles of community for the University of California, Berkeley,
> are rooted in our mission of teaching, research and public service. They
> reflect our passion for critical inquiry, debate, discovery and
> innovation, and our deep commitment to contributing to a better world.
> Every member of the UC Berkeley community has a role in sustaining a safe,
> caring and humane environment in which these values can thrive.
>
> * We place honesty and integrity in our teaching, learning, research
> and administration at the highest level.
> * We recognize the intrinsic relationship between diversity and
> excellence in all our endeavors.
> * We affirm the dignity of all individuals and strive to uphold a just
> community in which discrimination and hate are not tolerated.
> * We are committed to ensuring freedom of expression and dialogue that
> elicits the full spectrum of views held by our varied communities.
> * We respect the differences as well as the commonalities that bring
> us together and call for civility and respect in our personal
> interactions.
> * We believe that active participation and leadership in addressing
> the most pressing issues facing our local and global communities are
> central to our educational mission.
> * We embrace open and equitable access to opportunities for learning
> and development as our obligation and goal.
>
> UC Berkeley's "Principles of Community" statement was developed
> collaboratively by students, faculty, staff, and alumni, and issued by the
> Chancellor. Its intent is to serve as an affirmation of the intrinsic and
> unique value of each member of the UC Berkeley community and as a guide
> for our personal and collective behavior, both on campus and as we serve
> society.
>
>
> +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> P. David Pearson
> Professor and Dean
> Graduate School of Education
> 1501 Tolman Hall #1670
> University of California, Berkeley
> Berkeley CA 94720-1670
Copenhagen Climate talks Suspended
Hope your finals are going better then the UN international climate change conference . The Huffington Post has updates on the situation. Essentially:
" ... the G77, which represents 130 developing countries "pulled the emergency plug" suspending the talks over wealthy countries' reluctance to discuss a legally binding emissions treaty".
" ... the G77, which represents 130 developing countries "pulled the emergency plug" suspending the talks over wealthy countries' reluctance to discuss a legally binding emissions treaty".
Carrico on Campus?
Hey Dale (and class), are you going to be in Berkeley today or tomorrow to accept anything that cannot be attached via email? If not, could I possibly send you a picture and then mail the final project to you? What works for you?
Many thanks,
Jen Cowitz
Many thanks,
Jen Cowitz
Sunday, December 13, 2009
General Comments
The last review section really helped put things in perspective for me. I got into an argument about what people really need earlier in the blog. My point then was that needs are hard to determine. Now I am starting to think there are a lot of things that we do not need but that we still need. Its because things that may just be offered as fetishized commercial items are chained to things we really need. For instance one may not need a book, but that book might lead the reader to realize how to better manage the needs she has. A vegetarian cookbook could do this. The value of that book is not really based on how much it costs, but what comes out of it.
There are so many entries that I cannot keep up anymore, but it was a great class and I learned a lot. Often academics can be completely useless in the real world, but Dale teaches in a way that seems to give a kind of agency to his students. The concept of peer to peer information becomes very important once we no longer have access or time to access University materials.
Finally I have to say that I am a capitalist as are you. Its not something for which we really have a choice in the matter. We all need jobs to pay bills and eat and eventually to feed our families etc. I wanted to buck the system and live a bohemian life without having to be part of the machine. Though I was able to find a fringe position in which I could exist (living like an artist in San Francisco), it became apparent to me that to really reach the audience I wanted to reach I would need capital. Now I am not saying that this going to be everybodies fate, but I suggest everybody keep in mind that we cannot truly extract ourselves from the systems in which we exist. College allows us a unique opportunity to be reflective and reflexive (which is more helpful then the former in the real world.) But just beyond those diplomas is survival. And I would be lying if I said I was not in school to improve my employment options. I hope if anybody reads this they do not find it to be a downer. To put it in the mildest form or criticism I can, I am simply trying to suggest that rather than fighting the system from the outside try and see how each of you can be a part of the system and still make positive changes within it that can have the kind of lasting effects that we as environmentally concious students would like to see. Often good can come from bad. Its not always easy to see the forest through the redwoods.
The End
Chris W
There are so many entries that I cannot keep up anymore, but it was a great class and I learned a lot. Often academics can be completely useless in the real world, but Dale teaches in a way that seems to give a kind of agency to his students. The concept of peer to peer information becomes very important once we no longer have access or time to access University materials.
Finally I have to say that I am a capitalist as are you. Its not something for which we really have a choice in the matter. We all need jobs to pay bills and eat and eventually to feed our families etc. I wanted to buck the system and live a bohemian life without having to be part of the machine. Though I was able to find a fringe position in which I could exist (living like an artist in San Francisco), it became apparent to me that to really reach the audience I wanted to reach I would need capital. Now I am not saying that this going to be everybodies fate, but I suggest everybody keep in mind that we cannot truly extract ourselves from the systems in which we exist. College allows us a unique opportunity to be reflective and reflexive (which is more helpful then the former in the real world.) But just beyond those diplomas is survival. And I would be lying if I said I was not in school to improve my employment options. I hope if anybody reads this they do not find it to be a downer. To put it in the mildest form or criticism I can, I am simply trying to suggest that rather than fighting the system from the outside try and see how each of you can be a part of the system and still make positive changes within it that can have the kind of lasting effects that we as environmentally concious students would like to see. Often good can come from bad. Its not always easy to see the forest through the redwoods.
The End
Chris W
Friday, December 11, 2009
Precis: Reversal of Fortune by Bill McKibben
There are two things that dominate this essay: happiness and wealth. The primary argument that McKiven is making is that for the last six decades (since the post-WWII economic boom) our country (and most of the world is catching on) has been seeking happiness through increasing it’s wealth. The question he ends up posing is whether or not wealth can create happiness, and though I think we all understand the basic assumption will be that “no it does not” McKibben goes into great detail about exactly why it is that wealth past a certain mark will not create happiness. Besides proving his point, there are certain other goals I will address that McKibben is attempting to achieve by convincing the reader that wealth and happiness are not necessarily dependent, and sometimes they are mutually exclusive.
McKibben makes the rhetorical move of putting the reader into a grouping of “us” at the very beginning: “They’ve built the unprecedented prosperity and ease that distinguish the lives of most of the people reading these words. It is no wonder and no accident that Smith’s ideas still dominate our politics, our outlook, even our personalities.” These lines do two things. First, they create an “us” for the readership. If you are reading this article you are likely one of the people that Smith’s philosophies have worked for. American, middle class, educated, a person with stuff. It is imperative that the reader identifies herself in this class because McKibben is making moves for the reader to see themselves as selfish and greedy, and as one of the causes for many of the problems this world is facing. Secondly, it establishes Smith as a relevant source, because what he said worked for YOU. McKibben from this point cannot completely disagree with the cited Smith, but for his argument he must show the reader that Smith’s ideas couldn’t predict the outcomes of his philosophies followed for such an extended period of time.
McKibben’s main points are stated at the very beginning: growth makes our lives worse, it isn’t making people wealthier, it is pushing the Earth’s physical limits (climate change and peak oil are given as examples) and his most important point that “growth no longer makes us happier.” Because of his first move identifying the reader as “one of us” he can now write from an us-central voice. By succeeding in this shift, McKibben manages to get the reader on his side through an appeal to credentials, i.e. ethos. By sharing in the same fate, we want to believe the solutions he offers. McKibben attempts to create an ethos that will include the left and right by citing both Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton as supporters of the viewpoint that “more is better.”
The first natural counter-argument to the argument that one could come up with is that wealth enables agency. The more money you have, the more possibility you have at choosing what type of life you will live, and therefore the more potential happiness you have. McKibben does anticipate this argument when he discusses how people have become more alienated now than ever. My favorite example is his use of the popular TV show Survivor, “No wonder the show that changed television more than any other in the past decade was Survivor, where the goal is to end up alone on the island, to manipulate and scheme until everyone is banished and leaves you by yourself with your money.” He goes on, with an even stronger argument, quoting a psychologist Barry Schwartz:
“’people who participate in religious communities are happier than those who are not.’ Which is striking, Schwartz adds, because social ties ‘actually decrease freedom of choice’—being a good friend involves sacrifice.”
And as he stated earlier in the piece “we have a surplus of individualism and a deficit of companionship, and so the second becomes more valuable.” So even if wealth does enable agency, it seems that this agency is based on individualism, which has nothing to do with happiness. The adds for a new movie have George Clooney stating “think of your happiest memories, are they ever by yourself?” So is McKibben arguing that happiness and agency are mutually exclusive? It seems that he is, but only to a certain point.
This is where the idea of a $10,000 annual income benchmark becomes very important. The number seems to come out of nowhere, but the important part of the message is that happiness requires a certain amount of wealth, but beyond that there is a property of diminishing returns (we have talked about this in class a few times). So whether or not one agrees with the actual number ($10,000 a year for me will cover rent, food and my phone…. but nothing else—including my education), there certainly is a number where money stops becoming as important as friends, family, and other non-essentials. Maslow already argued this years ago with his hierarchy of needs—where we can see that money can buy physiological needs (food, water, shelter) and most safety needs (security of health, property, employment) but definitely nothing higher than these two most base levels. As the Beatles said “money can’t buy me love.”
After reading this piece I think the final purpose is both to inform a reader, and spur her into action. It achieves this goal by creating a very strong identification bond where the reader feels like McKibben understands exactly what is going on in their world. His use of pathos ( it has forced us to become more thoroughly individualistic than we really want to be) and ethos (by creating the “us” voice used everywhere in the text) seem to be more important than his logos, but he uses logos in every argument as well, mostly by using credible sources to back up his claims and by finding examples that draw attention (the floor plans of new homes, the Survivor example). By creating an audience that should identify with him as a speaker, and it may even spur some into action. For me, it made me want to read more of his stuff, and also put off buying an iPod even longer (as I have never owned one because I know as soon as I buy one, I will have to buy a new one in a year, and then the new nano… etc etc).
In Class Report on Local Beef
Here are the links to Niman Ranch and Golden Gate Meat Company - a couple places where you can still get better beef... hopefully.
www.nimanranch.com
www.goldengatemeatcompany.com
What if cheap beef were outlawed? Can we one day live in a world where cows are raised and slaughtered more humanely? What would be the costs of such a project if it were to be applied globally and who would be able to afford to stay carnivorous? How much would this reduce the world's meat consumption? ???
www.nimanranch.com
www.goldengatemeatcompany.com
What if cheap beef were outlawed? Can we one day live in a world where cows are raised and slaughtered more humanely? What would be the costs of such a project if it were to be applied globally and who would be able to afford to stay carnivorous? How much would this reduce the world's meat consumption? ???
Precis for Californian Ideology
In their essay “Californian Ideology,” Richard Barbrook and Andy Cameron offer up critique after critique of California’s techno-savvy, “culturally wacky”, blinded-by-ambition entrepreneurs. The two writers coin the term and define “Californian Ideology” as “a mix of cybernetics, free market economics, and counter-culture libertarianism.” They go on to describe it as an enticing “faith” as well as an exportable “fashion.”
“Implacable in its certainties, the Californian Ideology offers a fatalistic vision of the natural and inevitable triumph of the hi-tech free market – a vision which is blind to racism, poverty and environmental degradation and which has no time to debate alternatives.” (thesis…I think)
In a nutshell, the Californian IT masters of the universe (the “virtual class”), through a “nearly universal belief in technological determinism” believe that pure freedom could be attained online. Their original hippie ideals, however, have been forgone in favor of an elitist, imperialist attitude and the larger picture replaced by a small-minded, damaging world view. Individualistic, democratic self-expression is drained out of the equation in favor of free market greed.
“Already ‘red lined’ by profit hungry telcos, the inhabitants of poor inner city areas can be shut out of the new on-line services through lack of money. In contrast, yuppies and their children can play at being cyperpunks in a virtual world without having to meet any of their impoverished neighbors.”
Instead of realizing a collective community (like the “agora” they refer to), this “ideology” only attains a further stratification of rich and poor where the rich get to plug into a fake reality and forget the bigger problems at hand.
The essay is written as a classic exposé of the corruption and misguidance behind a shiny new product. It is academic, but also sarcastic and humorous; educated, yet colloquial. It is also scathingly critical at every step. Its primary audience is anyone who goes online and enjoys a good blog and who might be unaware of the imperialistic forces at work behind the pretty web pages. In some ways it is a call to action – a wake up call to those who have forgotten all the good things that can come from advanced information technologies because they’re too busy buying and buying in.
The authors use various techniques to critique and discredit the Californian Ideologists. Twice in the paper the Ideology’s future is likened to sci-fi novels – romantic, but unrealistic and unpractical. The founders of the Ideology are constantly referred to as “hippies,” but hippies who lost their way. “…The cultural divide between the hippie and the organization man has now become fuzzy.” They critique the Ideologists for having a “profoundly anti-statist dogma” and priding themselves on being self-made, while gladly accepting government assistance and public funds to further their projects. An interesting point in the essay comes in a section entitled “the myth of the free market.” The first half of the section describes 19th and 20th century government intervention in technological development and ends at Nazi Germany’s failure to produce the first electronic computer. The essay then seamlessly transitions forward from history to the present where the US government pours “unacknowledged and uncosted” billions into the Californian Silicon Valley. The transition is not well explained, but leaves a bad taste in the mind of the reader.
Barbrook and Cameron continue to play up the contradictions embedded in the Ideology when they contrast the “celebrated libertarian individualism of the hippies” with the too-oft-forgotten “political and social demands of the counter-culture.” This critique culminates in an examination of Thomas Jefferson.
“The life of Thomas Jefferson – one of the icons of the Californian ideologists – clearly demonstrates the double nature of liberal individualism. The man who wrote the inspiring and poetic call for democracy and liberty in the American declaration of independence was at the same time one of the largest slave-owners in the country.”
The authors often take on the voice of those they are critiquing in a “so the argument goes” type of attack – one where the argument is easily refuted because the opposition can word it in a satirical way.
The only question mark in the piece comes after the question, “whose progress?” This emphasizes the way in which the original hippies have strayed from the path of altruism and have instead discovered the path to financial enlightenment instead.
In summation of their attacks, Barbrook and Cameron warn the reader of a Brave New World future where “individual freedom is no longer to be achieved by rebelling against the system, but through submission to the natural laws of technological progress and the free market.” (There’s our favorite word again…)
“Implacable in its certainties, the Californian Ideology offers a fatalistic vision of the natural and inevitable triumph of the hi-tech free market – a vision which is blind to racism, poverty and environmental degradation and which has no time to debate alternatives.” (thesis…I think)
In a nutshell, the Californian IT masters of the universe (the “virtual class”), through a “nearly universal belief in technological determinism” believe that pure freedom could be attained online. Their original hippie ideals, however, have been forgone in favor of an elitist, imperialist attitude and the larger picture replaced by a small-minded, damaging world view. Individualistic, democratic self-expression is drained out of the equation in favor of free market greed.
“Already ‘red lined’ by profit hungry telcos, the inhabitants of poor inner city areas can be shut out of the new on-line services through lack of money. In contrast, yuppies and their children can play at being cyperpunks in a virtual world without having to meet any of their impoverished neighbors.”
Instead of realizing a collective community (like the “agora” they refer to), this “ideology” only attains a further stratification of rich and poor where the rich get to plug into a fake reality and forget the bigger problems at hand.
The essay is written as a classic exposé of the corruption and misguidance behind a shiny new product. It is academic, but also sarcastic and humorous; educated, yet colloquial. It is also scathingly critical at every step. Its primary audience is anyone who goes online and enjoys a good blog and who might be unaware of the imperialistic forces at work behind the pretty web pages. In some ways it is a call to action – a wake up call to those who have forgotten all the good things that can come from advanced information technologies because they’re too busy buying and buying in.
The authors use various techniques to critique and discredit the Californian Ideologists. Twice in the paper the Ideology’s future is likened to sci-fi novels – romantic, but unrealistic and unpractical. The founders of the Ideology are constantly referred to as “hippies,” but hippies who lost their way. “…The cultural divide between the hippie and the organization man has now become fuzzy.” They critique the Ideologists for having a “profoundly anti-statist dogma” and priding themselves on being self-made, while gladly accepting government assistance and public funds to further their projects. An interesting point in the essay comes in a section entitled “the myth of the free market.” The first half of the section describes 19th and 20th century government intervention in technological development and ends at Nazi Germany’s failure to produce the first electronic computer. The essay then seamlessly transitions forward from history to the present where the US government pours “unacknowledged and uncosted” billions into the Californian Silicon Valley. The transition is not well explained, but leaves a bad taste in the mind of the reader.
Barbrook and Cameron continue to play up the contradictions embedded in the Ideology when they contrast the “celebrated libertarian individualism of the hippies” with the too-oft-forgotten “political and social demands of the counter-culture.” This critique culminates in an examination of Thomas Jefferson.
“The life of Thomas Jefferson – one of the icons of the Californian ideologists – clearly demonstrates the double nature of liberal individualism. The man who wrote the inspiring and poetic call for democracy and liberty in the American declaration of independence was at the same time one of the largest slave-owners in the country.”
The authors often take on the voice of those they are critiquing in a “so the argument goes” type of attack – one where the argument is easily refuted because the opposition can word it in a satirical way.
The only question mark in the piece comes after the question, “whose progress?” This emphasizes the way in which the original hippies have strayed from the path of altruism and have instead discovered the path to financial enlightenment instead.
In summation of their attacks, Barbrook and Cameron warn the reader of a Brave New World future where “individual freedom is no longer to be achieved by rebelling against the system, but through submission to the natural laws of technological progress and the free market.” (There’s our favorite word again…)
Precis on the Johannesburg Declaration
The Johannesburg Declaration on Sustainable Development was drafted at the United Nations’ World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002. The declaration reaffirms previous documentation on sustainable development and promotes new ideas concerning development for both the rich and poor nations of the globe. Basically, this document argues that humanity must unite to confront the environmental problems we face. We must work together to develop sustainably so we do not harm the needs of future generations because of our current wants.
This declaration is written with the input of most nations of the world, and is addressed to the same audience. While I feel the declaration is directed towards various world governments and NGOs working in the environmental field, this document applies to all citizens of the world, myself included. It outlines the importance of sustainable developmental and the steps towards building a sustainable world. By viewing this document as applicable to all world citizens, then the ideas it promotes are scaled much smaller than otherwise intended. In this regard, nations can still promote these policies through legislative means on a grand scale, and individuals can enact change in their own lives to protect their future generations. By reading it this way, individuals will realize the interconnectedness of the globe and how our individual actions affect those around the world.
This piece heavily builds upon previously documents produced by the United Nations. It calls upon the UN previous definitions of sustainable development, and also adds to the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development. While it does refer to these previous documents, the piece does not raise a defense against possible objections. The language of the declaration is vague and general, so I cannot foresee many objections that would be raised by the audience to which it appeals.
This document addresses the problems of a growing world and its impact on lesser developed countries. These countries bear the brunt of development’s environmental impacts, and only add to environmental problems when they begin to develop. With these facts, the document states its thesis through various opening points which boil down to one central argument that the global society must work together to spur development of the poor while eradicating environmental harm. The Johannesburg Declaration argues that the world must make changes now to protect future generations. The developed world must aid the developing world, so they can grow sustainably without further harm to the environment. By making such an argument, the Declaration tries to alter current opinions about sustainable development. It encourages wealthy nations to aid nations so they do not resort to cheaper, less efficient sources of development. It hopes to compromise the growth of the developing world with the environmental goals of wealthier nations.
These arguments depend on certain assumptions about the state of the world. This document requires the reader to assume that much of the world is living in poverty, and this impoverished world is in need of development. Yet, as they develop, they will add to the problem of ecological degradation. Thus it is the duty of the developed countries to aid the developing so they can both lift themselves out of poverty and not contribute to environmental problems. While I think these are all valid assumptions, I think the document must do more to strengthen these arguments. It must clearly state what is at stake for the developed countries as LDCs begin to develop, giving credence to the idea that developed countries must assist them so they can develop sustainably. Developed and developing countries may find fault with the ideas presented here. These countries will bear a great cost if the resolutions presented here are enacted. The declaration makes no mention of cost or economic effects of the plan it outlines.
The Johannesburg Declaration hopes to bring awareness to the plight of developing countries while encouraging the growth and development of these countries. It uses no metaphoric or figurative language, and instead relies on literal language so it clearly outlines its goals. This is a document that will be reproduced in various languages (or was possibly translated from another language) so any figurative language would be lost. Despite this lack of creative writing, the Johannesburg Declaration still informs the reader of the stakes of global development and promotes forms of sustainable development with particular attention to poor countries.
This declaration is written with the input of most nations of the world, and is addressed to the same audience. While I feel the declaration is directed towards various world governments and NGOs working in the environmental field, this document applies to all citizens of the world, myself included. It outlines the importance of sustainable developmental and the steps towards building a sustainable world. By viewing this document as applicable to all world citizens, then the ideas it promotes are scaled much smaller than otherwise intended. In this regard, nations can still promote these policies through legislative means on a grand scale, and individuals can enact change in their own lives to protect their future generations. By reading it this way, individuals will realize the interconnectedness of the globe and how our individual actions affect those around the world.
This piece heavily builds upon previously documents produced by the United Nations. It calls upon the UN previous definitions of sustainable development, and also adds to the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development. While it does refer to these previous documents, the piece does not raise a defense against possible objections. The language of the declaration is vague and general, so I cannot foresee many objections that would be raised by the audience to which it appeals.
This document addresses the problems of a growing world and its impact on lesser developed countries. These countries bear the brunt of development’s environmental impacts, and only add to environmental problems when they begin to develop. With these facts, the document states its thesis through various opening points which boil down to one central argument that the global society must work together to spur development of the poor while eradicating environmental harm. The Johannesburg Declaration argues that the world must make changes now to protect future generations. The developed world must aid the developing world, so they can grow sustainably without further harm to the environment. By making such an argument, the Declaration tries to alter current opinions about sustainable development. It encourages wealthy nations to aid nations so they do not resort to cheaper, less efficient sources of development. It hopes to compromise the growth of the developing world with the environmental goals of wealthier nations.
These arguments depend on certain assumptions about the state of the world. This document requires the reader to assume that much of the world is living in poverty, and this impoverished world is in need of development. Yet, as they develop, they will add to the problem of ecological degradation. Thus it is the duty of the developed countries to aid the developing so they can both lift themselves out of poverty and not contribute to environmental problems. While I think these are all valid assumptions, I think the document must do more to strengthen these arguments. It must clearly state what is at stake for the developed countries as LDCs begin to develop, giving credence to the idea that developed countries must assist them so they can develop sustainably. Developed and developing countries may find fault with the ideas presented here. These countries will bear a great cost if the resolutions presented here are enacted. The declaration makes no mention of cost or economic effects of the plan it outlines.
The Johannesburg Declaration hopes to bring awareness to the plight of developing countries while encouraging the growth and development of these countries. It uses no metaphoric or figurative language, and instead relies on literal language so it clearly outlines its goals. This is a document that will be reproduced in various languages (or was possibly translated from another language) so any figurative language would be lost. Despite this lack of creative writing, the Johannesburg Declaration still informs the reader of the stakes of global development and promotes forms of sustainable development with particular attention to poor countries.
12 cleanest and dirties veggies
I found an article that lists the 12 "dirtiest" or most chemically treated/pesticide intensive fruits and vegetables, as well as the 12 "cleanest" or ones lowest in pesticides. The article recommends buying the 12 dirtiest organic.
Dirty Dozen: Peaches, Apples, Sweet bell peppers, Celery, Nectarines, Strawberries, Cherries, Lettuce, Grapes, Pears, Spinach, and Potatoes.
Cleanest 12: Onions, Avocado, Sweet Corn, Pineapples, Mango, Sweet peas, Asparagus, Kiwi, Bananas, Cabbage, Broccoli, and Eggplant.
Dirty Dozen: Peaches, Apples, Sweet bell peppers, Celery, Nectarines, Strawberries, Cherries, Lettuce, Grapes, Pears, Spinach, and Potatoes.
Cleanest 12: Onions, Avocado, Sweet Corn, Pineapples, Mango, Sweet peas, Asparagus, Kiwi, Bananas, Cabbage, Broccoli, and Eggplant.
Wwoof experiences?
Wwoof (Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms)
I'm thinking about volunteering on a farm (maybe in Hawaii) next year and was wondering if anyone has had any personal experience, or has heard about friends' experiences, with Wwoof farms? I hear generally good things about the program but would appreciate any additional info or tips. Thanks!
General Website: http://www.wwoof.org/index.asp
I'm thinking about volunteering on a farm (maybe in Hawaii) next year and was wondering if anyone has had any personal experience, or has heard about friends' experiences, with Wwoof farms? I hear generally good things about the program but would appreciate any additional info or tips. Thanks!
General Website: http://www.wwoof.org/index.asp
A Precis for Vandana Shiva
Vandana Shiva's argument is a plea to her fellow Indians and legislators to insist on the revision of global intellectual property regimes that allow for the patent and exploitation of indigenous methods and technologies. Such patents allow for the piracy of indigenous knowledge for the benefit of western corporations. Her most proximate example is a recent US patent issued to a pharmaceutical research company based in New Jersey for the proprietary use of 'karela', 'jamun','brinjal' to treat diabetes. Shiva is outraged that the method, a traditional and everyday Indian practice, has been deeded to the exclusive ownership of two assignees in the United States.
Shiva substantiates her argument by tracing the destructive implications of such US patent law. The ante of outrage goes up with each argumentative turn. Starting with the LOGICAL ABSURDITY: how can you patent and own something that has been in practice for hundreds if not thousands of years. To revealing the INSTITUTIONALIZED "Piracy" of the American patent system: historically, the US has condoned the theft of foreign technologies in order to foster national comparative advantage. Here, Shiva effectively illustrates the insidiousness of such traditions by anecdotally tying the practice back to America's trade revolution against the British. Also by directly quoting the failings in US IP law to bar patents requested for "prior art" in a way that does not discriminate against indigenous methods in underdeveloped countries (proof of "prior art" can only be made in foreign or domestic trade publications). Next, and most compelling, Shiva describes the GLOBALIZATION of such a flawed intellectual property regimes: as a result American economic hegemony has imprinted these elementally flawed patent laws onto international regulatory bodies that would then have jurisdiction to prohibit developing nations from the commercialization and foreign trade of their own indigenous methods. As a quick aside, I am surprised that she doesn't play out the logical extension of her argument; that, if enforced, Indians would be forced to license for the use of their own indigenous technologies.
After reading her Op-Ed, "The US Patent System Legalizes Theft and Biopiracy, I get the distinct impression that Vandana Shiva has a deep appreciation of the 90's eco-classic "The Medicine Man". For those who don't recollect the film, don't fear, I have engaged in multiple screening. In short, a very beautiful biochemist is sent by a pharmaceutical company to the Amazonian rainforest to check on Sean Connery who, in a fit of deep research, had cut of ties with the outside world. After a lot of brooding and classic Connery unfriendliness, he finally admits having found a cure for cancer, but has failed to recreate the naturally occurring formula that was given to him by a tribal medicine man. The original effective serum is running low as a nearby logging company builds a road headed straight for the village to begin chopping. Connery refuses to ask the powerful pharmaceutical company for help in halting the logging but is paralyzed by the knowledge that hints of a cancer cure will warrant in numerous researchers whose foreign diseases would wipeout the native tribe. Ultimately, a fight ensues between Connery and a bulldozer that starts a massive forest fire just as the beautiful biochemist realizes the cancer cure was a product not of a flower, as assumed, but a species of rare indigenous ant. As so happens, the local population of ant was completely wiped out with the fiery destruction of their habitat.
At this point Shiva is on her feet, whooping very loudly. From her perspective the Western corporate interests have been doubly stymied. The logging and pharmaceutical corporations have been hindered in their exploitation of third world timber and a locally practiced cure. However Shiva fails to recognize two vital points. Firstly, the abuse of patent rights goes both ways. If Shiva is anything like the majority of her fellow Indians, she has likely watched "Medicine Man" on a pirated DVD. The circuit board in her generic DVD player, the word processing software on her computer are undoubtedly based upon a foreign model. The blackmarket pills fighting malaria in India's northern province, AIDS in Africa most often are not subject to intellectual property enforcement. Yes, unfair enforcement mechanisms discriminate against indigenous products and methods, but is Shiva willing to trade the illegal proliferation of western products to get back the indigenously derived diabetes medicine and Bazmati rice? In my opinion, I cheer the blackmarkets who allow helpful technologies to reach the largest amounts of people for the lowest costs. The indigenous products that do not qualify as "prior art" will not make India rich. She must grasp it is the Indian intellectuals, software programmers, and engineers (all of whom document their work) who will achieve this. Secondly, and more prescient to our course, I challenge the her claims of ownership over such indigenous products. Her prime example, the health benefits of certain plants, are not a product of Indian ingenuity but its environment. the cancer cure of "medicine man" was a naturally occurrence. The duration of their existence is on a time scale where "indigenous" is but a blip.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Carbon Footprints and Immigration
Here's a link to the video I showed in class sponsored by CAPS, Californians for population stabilization:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDFFbiIbm2c
And here is a link to their website:
http://www.capsweb.org/
--Karina Grifka
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDFFbiIbm2c
And here is a link to their website:
http://www.capsweb.org/
--Karina Grifka
Report: Green Sidewalks
FUF -Friends of Urban Forrestry
I personally think they have one of the better acronyms. I really wanted to talk about SLUG (San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners) but they don't seem to exist any more. But I will post if they respond to any of the phone calls or emails I sent to them.
-DJ Swire
I personally think they have one of the better acronyms. I really wanted to talk about SLUG (San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners) but they don't seem to exist any more. But I will post if they respond to any of the phone calls or emails I sent to them.
-DJ Swire
Hi Class.
This is Masih, I did my report about backpacks that charge your phones a few weeks ago. Here is the link:
http://www.v-dimension.com/en/products/view.php?prod=V-DIM-HELIUS
Masih Ebrahimi
This is Masih, I did my report about backpacks that charge your phones a few weeks ago. Here is the link:
http://www.v-dimension.com/en/products/view.php?prod=V-DIM-HELIUS
Masih Ebrahimi
Precis, The Shallow and the Deep
"The Shallow and the Deep", a summary of Deep Ecology by Arne Naess, reveals a watershed moment for ecologists during the early 1970s. A chasm was forming in the ecological movement: On the one hand, the "shallow but presently rather powerful movement" and the other hand, "a deep, but less influential movement".
The Deep Ecology Movement is, for Naess, the only appropriate way to create ecologically-sound policies, for the shallow movement not only fails to provide effective solutions for the existing problems, but leads to the creation of more problems. Naess argues that the ecological movement should not be limited to the discussion of pollution and resource depletion. Scaring people with environmental catastrophe doesn't provide the necessary means to what Naess believes to be the end of "Deep Ecology". The Deep movement has great political potentials that go beyond the mere reduction of environmental degradation, and what Naess strives is to expand the capability of the ecology movement.
Although Naess derives his authority from the science of ecology, and the facts associate with it, the Deep Ecology movement is not derived from ecology by logic, but mainly from ecological knowledge. He takes a moment to differentiate between the ecological and philosophical elements of deep ecology, using ecosophy to describe this harmony. Naess explains the nature of the system of the argument he presents: "The basic relation is that between subsets of premises and subsets of conclusions, that is, the relation of drivability." Ecosophy will take many forms due to the variation of "facts" about ecology and value priorities. However, his seven points is an attempt to create a unified framework.
The first ecology movement, the Shallow, the author simply defines as a movement by those who struggle for protecting resources and addressing pollution in order to maintain the affluent and healthy lifestyle of people in developed countries.
Naess breaks the Deep movement into seven sections. The first point argues for a way to conceive human's place in nature. Instead of understanding human an isolated entity in an environment, Deep ecology understands humans, and other organisms to have intrinsic relations, and that our understanding of organisms is directly dependent on these relations.
The second argument addresses "biospherical egalitarianism", claiming that all organisms have the equal right to live and while opposing the notion of restricting this right to humans. Naess argues that anthropocentrism creates detrimental effects on the human living standards by saying that ignoring human's dependency on the environment, leads to "alienation of man from himself". Since Anthropocentrism is a polemical topic, the author employs idiosyncratic ecological definitions to provide a tone of scientific legitimacy when he discusses the future research variable of "level of crowding" and its behavior effects on that species.
In his third argument, Naess addresses the significance of diversity and symbiosis. He uses the concept "survival of the fittest" in its most paradoxical understanding when he argues that the survival of humans depends on their ability to maintain natural diversity through "the ability to coexist and cooperate". The traditional view of survival as competitive killing and exploitation destroys other species and communities within a species, and greatly decreases diversity and therefore survival.
In his next argument, Naess expands on the exploitation and suppression of groups within a community. Through this exploitation, a hierarchy is formed that benefits no one. This addresses the growing stratification among nations and societies.
The fifth argument refers to the most supported aspect of the ecological movement: "the fight against pollution and resources depletion". This dogmatic and unenlightened support leads to a band-aide approach that can generate more problems, instead of a holistic one. For this reason Naess argues that there is an ethical responsibility for ecologists to support the Deep movement.
Then he clarifies the distinction between complexity and complication. Ecologists acknowledge the "profound human ignorance of biosphereical relationships" and demonstrate the ecosystem’s complexity. Division of labor, not fragmentation of labor, is analogous to this ecological argument. By taking the complexity of ecosystemic into account and accounting for our ignorance, future research should produce clarifications of possibilities and less prognosis.
Lastly, Naess argues for local autonomy and decentralization. The significance of this policy is due to "the vulnerability of a form of life is roughly proportional to the weight of influences from afar". Accordingly self-governance and self-sufficiency is critical.
The Deep Ecology Movement is, for Naess, the only appropriate way to create ecologically-sound policies, for the shallow movement not only fails to provide effective solutions for the existing problems, but leads to the creation of more problems. Naess argues that the ecological movement should not be limited to the discussion of pollution and resource depletion. Scaring people with environmental catastrophe doesn't provide the necessary means to what Naess believes to be the end of "Deep Ecology". The Deep movement has great political potentials that go beyond the mere reduction of environmental degradation, and what Naess strives is to expand the capability of the ecology movement.
Although Naess derives his authority from the science of ecology, and the facts associate with it, the Deep Ecology movement is not derived from ecology by logic, but mainly from ecological knowledge. He takes a moment to differentiate between the ecological and philosophical elements of deep ecology, using ecosophy to describe this harmony. Naess explains the nature of the system of the argument he presents: "The basic relation is that between subsets of premises and subsets of conclusions, that is, the relation of drivability." Ecosophy will take many forms due to the variation of "facts" about ecology and value priorities. However, his seven points is an attempt to create a unified framework.
The first ecology movement, the Shallow, the author simply defines as a movement by those who struggle for protecting resources and addressing pollution in order to maintain the affluent and healthy lifestyle of people in developed countries.
Naess breaks the Deep movement into seven sections. The first point argues for a way to conceive human's place in nature. Instead of understanding human an isolated entity in an environment, Deep ecology understands humans, and other organisms to have intrinsic relations, and that our understanding of organisms is directly dependent on these relations.
The second argument addresses "biospherical egalitarianism", claiming that all organisms have the equal right to live and while opposing the notion of restricting this right to humans. Naess argues that anthropocentrism creates detrimental effects on the human living standards by saying that ignoring human's dependency on the environment, leads to "alienation of man from himself". Since Anthropocentrism is a polemical topic, the author employs idiosyncratic ecological definitions to provide a tone of scientific legitimacy when he discusses the future research variable of "level of crowding" and its behavior effects on that species.
In his third argument, Naess addresses the significance of diversity and symbiosis. He uses the concept "survival of the fittest" in its most paradoxical understanding when he argues that the survival of humans depends on their ability to maintain natural diversity through "the ability to coexist and cooperate". The traditional view of survival as competitive killing and exploitation destroys other species and communities within a species, and greatly decreases diversity and therefore survival.
In his next argument, Naess expands on the exploitation and suppression of groups within a community. Through this exploitation, a hierarchy is formed that benefits no one. This addresses the growing stratification among nations and societies.
The fifth argument refers to the most supported aspect of the ecological movement: "the fight against pollution and resources depletion". This dogmatic and unenlightened support leads to a band-aide approach that can generate more problems, instead of a holistic one. For this reason Naess argues that there is an ethical responsibility for ecologists to support the Deep movement.
Then he clarifies the distinction between complexity and complication. Ecologists acknowledge the "profound human ignorance of biosphereical relationships" and demonstrate the ecosystem’s complexity. Division of labor, not fragmentation of labor, is analogous to this ecological argument. By taking the complexity of ecosystemic into account and accounting for our ignorance, future research should produce clarifications of possibilities and less prognosis.
Lastly, Naess argues for local autonomy and decentralization. The significance of this policy is due to "the vulnerability of a form of life is roughly proportional to the weight of influences from afar". Accordingly self-governance and self-sufficiency is critical.
Clorox "Green Works"
Presentation for Vanessa Lord:
I realized I'd forgotten to post on the blog about my presentation I did way back when in September. I spoke about "Greenwashing" and Clorox's relatively new cleaning solution "Greenworks."
Here is the greenworks website where you can review some of the advertising techniques that publicly "green" their company:
http://www.greenworkspresskit.com/
and another news article from which I got much of my research about the actual ingredients in greenworks:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/01/14/MNN7UC1IQ.DTL
The quote I ended my presentation with was from the CEO of 7th generation, Jeffery Hollender, and it summed up my feelings on the subject as well:
"'Green' is not something a company becomes because of a new product line, a marketing campaign, a decision to be carbon neutral or even the selection of an enlightened new CEO. 'Green' is about the inside, not the outside of a company. It's about its DNA, its culture, and its very reason for being."
Is Clorox Green Works really green?
p.s. I shared with the class some ideas for green cleaning solutions that you can make yourself and here is that list as well:
CITRUS FLOOR CLEANSER
1 gallon hot water
2 tablespoons liquid castile soap
15 drops sweet orange essential oil
1/ cup lemon juice
(combine in large bucket)
WINDOW CLEANSER
3 cups water
1/4 cup white vinegar
1 tbsp lemon juice
(mix and spray)
ON-THE-SPOT STAIN LIFTER
2 tablespoons cream of tartar
2 drops lemon essential oil
water
(combine to make paste, spread on stain, allow to dry before washing)
BATHROOM CLEANSER
1/2 cup baking soda
1/4 cup white vinegar
10 drops tea tree essential oil
(combine, scrub with brush, and flush)
Vanessa Lord
I realized I'd forgotten to post on the blog about my presentation I did way back when in September. I spoke about "Greenwashing" and Clorox's relatively new cleaning solution "Greenworks."
Here is the greenworks website where you can review some of the advertising techniques that publicly "green" their company:
http://www.greenworkspresskit.com/
and another news article from which I got much of my research about the actual ingredients in greenworks:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/01/14/MNN7UC1IQ.DTL
The quote I ended my presentation with was from the CEO of 7th generation, Jeffery Hollender, and it summed up my feelings on the subject as well:
"'Green' is not something a company becomes because of a new product line, a marketing campaign, a decision to be carbon neutral or even the selection of an enlightened new CEO. 'Green' is about the inside, not the outside of a company. It's about its DNA, its culture, and its very reason for being."
Is Clorox Green Works really green?
p.s. I shared with the class some ideas for green cleaning solutions that you can make yourself and here is that list as well:
CITRUS FLOOR CLEANSER
1 gallon hot water
2 tablespoons liquid castile soap
15 drops sweet orange essential oil
1/ cup lemon juice
(combine in large bucket)
WINDOW CLEANSER
3 cups water
1/4 cup white vinegar
1 tbsp lemon juice
(mix and spray)
ON-THE-SPOT STAIN LIFTER
2 tablespoons cream of tartar
2 drops lemon essential oil
water
(combine to make paste, spread on stain, allow to dry before washing)
BATHROOM CLEANSER
1/2 cup baking soda
1/4 cup white vinegar
10 drops tea tree essential oil
(combine, scrub with brush, and flush)
Vanessa Lord
Precis: A Roadmap for Natural Capitalism
by Vanessa Lord
In “A Road Map for Natural Capitalism,” the authors contend that altering business practices in ways that will help save the environment can ultimately improve a business’ bottom line and make it more competitive in the future economy. The article appeared in the Harvard Business Review—a journal for the current and future business leaders of America—ten years ago. The authors’ argument seeks to find an acceptable compromise between pursuit of two seemingly exclusive goals: a compromise between the protection of the earth’s natural resources and a business’ ability to make a substantial profit in a capitalist society. They say, “The reason companies (and governments) are so prodigal with ecosystem services is that the value of those services doesn’t appear on the business balance sheet. But that’s a staggering omission. The economy, after all, is embedded in the environment.” For the authors, wasteful consumption of natural resources in the modern economy is not only bad for the environment and for the future of our planet, it’s just plain bad business. From that follows the idea that if we start practicing business the way it was intended—by economizing our scarcest resources—we will save the environment in the process. Explicitly, it states its thesis as, “Business strategies built around the radically more productive use of natural resources can solve many environmental problems at a profit.” The article serves as an instructional roadmap for the future business leaders of America to follow as they make business decisions. The authors contend that there are four main stops on the “roadmap”:
1. dramatically increase the productivity of natural resources
2. shift to biologically inspired production models
3. move to a solutions based business model
4. reinvest in natural capital
The argument is particularly compelling, especially to the business set, because it is essentially comforting. The other environmentalists were too doomsday, the authors seem to say. It is not our lifestyle behavior that needs to be drastically changed in order to save the planet; business leaders just have to start practicing smarter business practices. Other texts we have analyzed in this class offered solutions that would be much more difficult to implicate—solutions that involve changing an entire way of life. This article lends hope to the idea that we aren’t doomed after all: we just have to, once again, trust in sturdy old capitalism.
The authors assume (and probably accurately so) that its readers—business leaders and future business leaders—will agree that markets can be predictable, trusted, and, when managed correctly, will result in profit for companies. The evidence in support of practicing each of the four roadmap points consists of statistics surrounding the successful bottom lines of companies who have followed these practices. It details how certain businesses have drastically minimized their use of natural resources while maximizing their profits, and it explains the way new technologies could do more of the same for more businesses in the future. It reads the same way a letter from a consultant written to the CEO of a big firm would read: namely, this is how you can cut costs and increase your bottom line.
Business jargon doesn’t seem out of place in a business journal, but the authors incorporate a discourse of nature into the text as well. In the authors’ argument, words like capital, value, and bottom line now seem to be applicable to environmental issues. The authors distinguish a drastic difference between natural resources and “ecosystem services,” (they say that is the distinction between exploitable resources, like petroleum that can be sold for profit, and the services that the earth provides for free, like maintainence of habitats and climates, etc.), and they put forth the term “natural capitalism” as their idea of what the future of capitalism will become if it follows the traditional capitalist logic of capitalizing on the scarcest resources. All of a sudden, mother nature seems to become a key player in big business. Mother nature provides ecosystem services in the sum of $33 trillion a year, they say. The article’s essential argument depends on these neologisms that work by combining environment and business, like “natural capitalism” and “ecosystem services.” These phrases are the rhetorical integration of our economical and ecological goals, and they are signifiers for the conceptual integration of those goals.
The “broken compass” serves as a recurring metaphor throughout the text. The compass stands for capitalism, essentially—for an invisible hand phenomenon. The fact that the compass is “broken” is indicative of the authors’ belief that “the instruments companies use to set their targets, measure their performance, and hand out rewards are faulty. In other words, the markets are full of distortions and perverse incentives.” The compass is still set on the premises of the world during the Industrial Revolution. If we reestabish these mechanisms, namely, fix the compass, capitalism will be successful, and as an added advantage we can do this in a way that preserves natural resources, the authors say. The compass metaphor is consistent with the use of the term “roadmap” as the title for the article. Both are interesting terms because they connote the type of tools pionneers used when first exploring nature in the sense of unknown territory. Pioneers used compasses when they explored, created maps, chartered terrain—when these pioneers, in a sense, made the natural world knowable and managable in the realm of the social construct of humankind. Similarly, with natural capitalism, ecological systems can become a part of the realm of capitalism.
Yet the authors seem to directly contradict their argument, and to finally get one thing irrefutably right, when they say: “In the industrial system, we can easily exchange machinery for labor. But no technology or amount of money can substitute for a stable climate and productive biosphere. Even proper pricing can’t replace the priceless.” But isn’t natural capitalism doing just that—putting a price on the priceless? The authors admit we cannot put a price on a stable climate and a productive biosphere, why then can we include ecosystem services as a integral aspect of the money-oriented “bottom lines” of the businesses that engage in “natural capitalism”?
Vanessa Lord
In “A Road Map for Natural Capitalism,” the authors contend that altering business practices in ways that will help save the environment can ultimately improve a business’ bottom line and make it more competitive in the future economy. The article appeared in the Harvard Business Review—a journal for the current and future business leaders of America—ten years ago. The authors’ argument seeks to find an acceptable compromise between pursuit of two seemingly exclusive goals: a compromise between the protection of the earth’s natural resources and a business’ ability to make a substantial profit in a capitalist society. They say, “The reason companies (and governments) are so prodigal with ecosystem services is that the value of those services doesn’t appear on the business balance sheet. But that’s a staggering omission. The economy, after all, is embedded in the environment.” For the authors, wasteful consumption of natural resources in the modern economy is not only bad for the environment and for the future of our planet, it’s just plain bad business. From that follows the idea that if we start practicing business the way it was intended—by economizing our scarcest resources—we will save the environment in the process. Explicitly, it states its thesis as, “Business strategies built around the radically more productive use of natural resources can solve many environmental problems at a profit.” The article serves as an instructional roadmap for the future business leaders of America to follow as they make business decisions. The authors contend that there are four main stops on the “roadmap”:
1. dramatically increase the productivity of natural resources
2. shift to biologically inspired production models
3. move to a solutions based business model
4. reinvest in natural capital
The argument is particularly compelling, especially to the business set, because it is essentially comforting. The other environmentalists were too doomsday, the authors seem to say. It is not our lifestyle behavior that needs to be drastically changed in order to save the planet; business leaders just have to start practicing smarter business practices. Other texts we have analyzed in this class offered solutions that would be much more difficult to implicate—solutions that involve changing an entire way of life. This article lends hope to the idea that we aren’t doomed after all: we just have to, once again, trust in sturdy old capitalism.
The authors assume (and probably accurately so) that its readers—business leaders and future business leaders—will agree that markets can be predictable, trusted, and, when managed correctly, will result in profit for companies. The evidence in support of practicing each of the four roadmap points consists of statistics surrounding the successful bottom lines of companies who have followed these practices. It details how certain businesses have drastically minimized their use of natural resources while maximizing their profits, and it explains the way new technologies could do more of the same for more businesses in the future. It reads the same way a letter from a consultant written to the CEO of a big firm would read: namely, this is how you can cut costs and increase your bottom line.
Business jargon doesn’t seem out of place in a business journal, but the authors incorporate a discourse of nature into the text as well. In the authors’ argument, words like capital, value, and bottom line now seem to be applicable to environmental issues. The authors distinguish a drastic difference between natural resources and “ecosystem services,” (they say that is the distinction between exploitable resources, like petroleum that can be sold for profit, and the services that the earth provides for free, like maintainence of habitats and climates, etc.), and they put forth the term “natural capitalism” as their idea of what the future of capitalism will become if it follows the traditional capitalist logic of capitalizing on the scarcest resources. All of a sudden, mother nature seems to become a key player in big business. Mother nature provides ecosystem services in the sum of $33 trillion a year, they say. The article’s essential argument depends on these neologisms that work by combining environment and business, like “natural capitalism” and “ecosystem services.” These phrases are the rhetorical integration of our economical and ecological goals, and they are signifiers for the conceptual integration of those goals.
The “broken compass” serves as a recurring metaphor throughout the text. The compass stands for capitalism, essentially—for an invisible hand phenomenon. The fact that the compass is “broken” is indicative of the authors’ belief that “the instruments companies use to set their targets, measure their performance, and hand out rewards are faulty. In other words, the markets are full of distortions and perverse incentives.” The compass is still set on the premises of the world during the Industrial Revolution. If we reestabish these mechanisms, namely, fix the compass, capitalism will be successful, and as an added advantage we can do this in a way that preserves natural resources, the authors say. The compass metaphor is consistent with the use of the term “roadmap” as the title for the article. Both are interesting terms because they connote the type of tools pionneers used when first exploring nature in the sense of unknown territory. Pioneers used compasses when they explored, created maps, chartered terrain—when these pioneers, in a sense, made the natural world knowable and managable in the realm of the social construct of humankind. Similarly, with natural capitalism, ecological systems can become a part of the realm of capitalism.
Yet the authors seem to directly contradict their argument, and to finally get one thing irrefutably right, when they say: “In the industrial system, we can easily exchange machinery for labor. But no technology or amount of money can substitute for a stable climate and productive biosphere. Even proper pricing can’t replace the priceless.” But isn’t natural capitalism doing just that—putting a price on the priceless? The authors admit we cannot put a price on a stable climate and a productive biosphere, why then can we include ecosystem services as a integral aspect of the money-oriented “bottom lines” of the businesses that engage in “natural capitalism”?
Vanessa Lord
Queer Ecology-Re-articulating the Language of Oppression (a precis)
In Unnatural Passions?: Notes Toward a Queer Ecology, Catriona Mortimer-Sandilands draws on established disciplines of ecofeminism and environmental justice, arguing that they “open our eyes to the fact that nature organizes and is organized by complex power relations. What queer ecology adds is the fact that these power relations include sexuality.” She examines the connection between sexuality and nature, first in terms of the institutions that categorize and qualify “nature” and “sexual identity,” most notably in the pathologization of non-normative sexual desire. She then goes on to point out a relationship between sexuality and the construction of natural space, such as urban and national parks, arguing that these spaces emerge from and serve to regulate and re-inforce normative sexual desire. She ends by exploring how a “queer ecological project” might challenge these normative power relations articulated within discourses of sexuality and nature, writing “My argument is thus that we should reorient our politics and take on what I am calling a queer ecological perspective, to work toward more critical possibilities responsive to the kinds of complex relations of power that I have thus far outlined. Here, I am advocating a position not only of queering ecology, but of greening queer politics.”
The article begins by describing a metaphor that seems to be fundamentally synonymous with an understanding of queer ecology, that of Jan Zita Grover's encounter with nature, Sandilands even describes her as a source for the development of the article: “With Grover as my guide, I am arguing that there is indeed such a thing as a queer ecology.” She expresses the value of Grover's perspective: “Grover, by taking elements of queer experience to construct an alternative environmental perspective. By this label, I mean that she focuses on dimensions of her experience born in the specific history of a queer community, and uses the resulting emotional resonances and conceptual links to live in nature in a way that reflects this queer experience. Simply put: Grover sees nature through queer eyes, and what she sees is important and unique.” The passage suggests that the queer experience can be used to alter the way one understands and lives within “natural” spaces, undermining perhaps the hetero-normative power-relations of spacial construction.
What is interesting about this metaphor to me is that despite its centrality to the article and supposed embodiment of the (or a) queer perspective, the language that Grover uses seems to re-articulate the language of oppression used to pathologize and marginalize queer people and queerness. For example, Sandilands writes of her experience, "The idea that one might find natural wholeness in this hard, boreal landscape was shattered at the sight of its large, multiple clear-cuts and the thin “idiot strips” of trees along the highways that foolishly attempt to conceal the scars to the landscape caused by the softwood pulp and paper industry.” She describes the effects of industry on the woods as “scars” and “artificial” and therefore devoid of “natural wholeness.” She uses these woods as a metaphor for the AIDS epidemic, and eventually learns to love and find beauty in the scars. She writes that the woods “offered me an unanticipated challenge, a spiritual discipline: to appreciate them, I needed to learn how to see their scars, defacement, and artificiality, and then beyond those to their strengths – their historicity, the difficult beauties that underlay their deformity.” Through the filter of her queer perspective, she does not learn to see the woods as whole but to look past their “deformity” to their positive attributes. Though this metaphor preaches the rhetoric of acceptance, it seems to re-enforce a certain articulation of what is “natural” and “unnatural,” problematic in light of how that rhetoric applies to queer sexuality. Granted she is speaking of AIDS and not sexual identity, but I feel a large part of the AIDS epidemic is the marginalization of those living with HIV/AIDS and the “unnatural” acts or desires associated with it. And furthermore, in terms of how a queer perspective may revolutionize an understanding of space, Grover's conceptualization of a “whole natural forest” does not seem to stray very far from the spacial understanding of a national forest as devoid of aboriginals, even if the political implications are very different.
So Grover's “queer experience” contains its own form of normativity, but hers is only one experience of many, right? Sandilands speaks of the value of the queer perspective to re-orient ourselves toward space, but whose queer perspective is it? She acknowledges that many queer discourses re-articulate normativity and therefore need to be “greened” up, but she only offers the examples of commercialism and gay marriage, neglecting the fact that even outside these obviously normative articulations, queer experiences are normative in complex ways, in terms of gender identity and expression, in terms of race, body type, and behavior. These are not directly linked to the normative articulations that Sandliland's points to: commercialism promoting waste, etc and gay marriage mirroring the hetero-normative paradigms that construct and are constructed by “natural spaces.” Is the queer experience valuable simply because it is unique? Can a queer understanding that is valuable to the re-articulation of space be extracted from individual subjectivity, in which these queer experiences are implicated in other problematic forms of normativity that construct and are constructed by space?
-Karina Grifka
The article begins by describing a metaphor that seems to be fundamentally synonymous with an understanding of queer ecology, that of Jan Zita Grover's encounter with nature, Sandilands even describes her as a source for the development of the article: “With Grover as my guide, I am arguing that there is indeed such a thing as a queer ecology.” She expresses the value of Grover's perspective: “Grover, by taking elements of queer experience to construct an alternative environmental perspective. By this label, I mean that she focuses on dimensions of her experience born in the specific history of a queer community, and uses the resulting emotional resonances and conceptual links to live in nature in a way that reflects this queer experience. Simply put: Grover sees nature through queer eyes, and what she sees is important and unique.” The passage suggests that the queer experience can be used to alter the way one understands and lives within “natural” spaces, undermining perhaps the hetero-normative power-relations of spacial construction.
What is interesting about this metaphor to me is that despite its centrality to the article and supposed embodiment of the (or a) queer perspective, the language that Grover uses seems to re-articulate the language of oppression used to pathologize and marginalize queer people and queerness. For example, Sandilands writes of her experience, "The idea that one might find natural wholeness in this hard, boreal landscape was shattered at the sight of its large, multiple clear-cuts and the thin “idiot strips” of trees along the highways that foolishly attempt to conceal the scars to the landscape caused by the softwood pulp and paper industry.” She describes the effects of industry on the woods as “scars” and “artificial” and therefore devoid of “natural wholeness.” She uses these woods as a metaphor for the AIDS epidemic, and eventually learns to love and find beauty in the scars. She writes that the woods “offered me an unanticipated challenge, a spiritual discipline: to appreciate them, I needed to learn how to see their scars, defacement, and artificiality, and then beyond those to their strengths – their historicity, the difficult beauties that underlay their deformity.” Through the filter of her queer perspective, she does not learn to see the woods as whole but to look past their “deformity” to their positive attributes. Though this metaphor preaches the rhetoric of acceptance, it seems to re-enforce a certain articulation of what is “natural” and “unnatural,” problematic in light of how that rhetoric applies to queer sexuality. Granted she is speaking of AIDS and not sexual identity, but I feel a large part of the AIDS epidemic is the marginalization of those living with HIV/AIDS and the “unnatural” acts or desires associated with it. And furthermore, in terms of how a queer perspective may revolutionize an understanding of space, Grover's conceptualization of a “whole natural forest” does not seem to stray very far from the spacial understanding of a national forest as devoid of aboriginals, even if the political implications are very different.
So Grover's “queer experience” contains its own form of normativity, but hers is only one experience of many, right? Sandilands speaks of the value of the queer perspective to re-orient ourselves toward space, but whose queer perspective is it? She acknowledges that many queer discourses re-articulate normativity and therefore need to be “greened” up, but she only offers the examples of commercialism and gay marriage, neglecting the fact that even outside these obviously normative articulations, queer experiences are normative in complex ways, in terms of gender identity and expression, in terms of race, body type, and behavior. These are not directly linked to the normative articulations that Sandliland's points to: commercialism promoting waste, etc and gay marriage mirroring the hetero-normative paradigms that construct and are constructed by “natural spaces.” Is the queer experience valuable simply because it is unique? Can a queer understanding that is valuable to the re-articulation of space be extracted from individual subjectivity, in which these queer experiences are implicated in other problematic forms of normativity that construct and are constructed by space?
-Karina Grifka
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