The Revolutionary Socialist Network, Workers
No need for revolution - changes are possible now
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- Diamond offers
- with environmental groups
- A similar scenario occurred when
- Instead, BP made a
- project in the United States
- This is all based on the idea that while a company can
- image for the purposes of their commercial relations throughout the world.
No need for revolution - changes are possible nowPadilla ’21 [Luis-Alberto; 2021; president of the board of the Guatemalan International Relations & Peace Research Institute (IRIPAZ), member of the International Peace Research Association (IPRA), former Secretary General of the Latin American Council on Peace Research (CLAIP), Director of the Diplomatic Academy, Former Vice Minister, former ambassador in Chile, former permanent representative to the United Nations at the Vienna International Centre, former ambassador to Austria, former ambassador to the Russian Federation, former ambassador to the Netherlands, permanent representative to the UN in Geneva, and professor of the Seminar of World Geopolitics at the Faculty of Political Sciences of the Catholic University Rafael Landivar (URL) of Guatemala; Sustainable Development in the Anthropocene, “Jared Diamond: Unsustainable Systems and Sustainability,” Ch. 4.9, p. 203-204] SPark However, in the same book Diamond offers some glimmers of hope. In the US state of Montana, despite the fact that mining companies were forced to retreat and that both agriculture and livestock have decreased due to land being repurposed for recreational activities for wealthy people who do not reside in the state, the important point is that environmental protection now takes precedence over mining, agricultural and industrial activities. Furthermore, in a notable example of ‘social responsibility’, the transnational company StillwaterMining, owner of a platinum and palladium mine, came to an understanding with environmental groups (including a trout protection NGO named Trout Unlimited), and also reached agreements with the local community regarding employment, education, electricity and citizen services in exchange for ecologists and citizens not opposing the operations of the mining company. A similar scenario occurred when the transnational corporation BP (British Petroleum) bought a large copper mine formerly owned by Anaconda, and rejected the previous mine-owner’s traditional policies of refusing to clean up pollution, financing local support groups favourable to its interests, declaring bankruptcy and other similar measures. Instead, BP made a commitment to carry out clean-up work without shirking its responsibilities towards the environment. In other meaningful cases, which are significant because they involve transnational corporations, Diamond cites the policies of companies such as the Chevron oil company in Papua New Guinea in the Kutubu oilfield that functions as a de facto national park. He further cites Chevron’s understanding with the Norwegian government in the North Sea; Rio Tinto in California; the American Dupont in titanium farms in the rutile-rich sands of Australian beaches; the proposed mining and sustainable development project in the United States (MMSD: Mining Minerals and Sustainable Development); and the experiences in the field of logging and the timber industry with the forest certification system established by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), to which companies such as Home Depot, Columbia Forest Products, the famous IKEA of Sweden, B & K of Great Britain, Anderson Corporation, Collins Pine, Lowe’s, Svea Skog and many others belong. This eco-labelling experiment (based on certificates) has also been adopted by the fishing industry under a similar name, the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), in which a range of companies from the World Wildlife Fund to companies such as Unilever, Marks & Spencer, Safeway, Young’s Bluecrest Seafood Co., Sainsbury’s, Safeway, Whole Foods, Migros, France Foods and several others are included. This is all based on the idea that while a company can maximize its benefits in the short term, it is in its long-term interest to adopt corporate social responsibility policies, not just to avoid causing harm to the environment and the population, and to ensure the adequate conservation of the forests and the fishing resources that provide them with their economic activity, but also to project a responsible image for the purposes of their commercial relations throughout the world. Alongside the protection and forest conservation policies of the Scandinavian and European countries in general, among which Germany stands out, and also the conservationist policies that were put in place in countries such as Japan (since the Tokugawa dynasty in the sixteenth century),25 some developing countries should also be highlighted. The Dominican Republic is a particularly good example of a country which has embraced sustainable forest development. A third of its territory has been declared protected areas and there are seventy-four national parks. This occurred as a result of the happy coincidence between the interests of environmental groups and personalities and the support they received from Joaquín Balaguer, a dominant figure in Dominican history during the last four decades of the twentieth century. In contrast, unipersonal dictatorships, structural violence, and the disastrous policy of forest depredation in Haiti, the country with which the Dominican Republic shares the island, led the Haitians into a situation of conflict and violence that forced the United Nations to intervene in order to avoid the total collapse of the society and its State. Download 2.09 Mb. Share with your friends:
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