Since the first two threads of this module are so involved, I am going to consolidate our discussion of “In Corporations We Trust” into this single thread.
In this last chapter of the textbook, the author draws our attention to the global economic framework that shapes (and is shaped by) our current environmental circumstances. In order to sketch this framework, Steinberg, broadens the historical and geographic frame-of-reference to consider the role of the environment in U.S. political foreign policy since WWII. I’ve broken this discussion into two parts.
Following WWII, the U.S. government wielded a technological revolution in agriculture–the Green Revolution–as part of its Cold War policy to “contain” communism.
• What were the significant technological developments that gave rise to the Green Revolution? What role did Norman Borlaug play?
o What were the altruistic intentions for promoting the Green Revolution in Third World countries–i.e., in India, Philippines, Turkey, Iran, Iraq, Brazil, Indonesia, Kenya, and Egypt.
o In what way was it intended to serve the geopolitical interests of NATO in its Cold War standoff with the USSR?
• What financial institutions/instruments were developed in conjunction with the Green Revolution?
• Explain the social/economic and environmental fallout of the Green Revolution in these Third World nations.
Turning to consider the global economic framework that developed since WWII, Steinberg writes: “Firmly centered on the rampant use of fossil fuels, the new economic arrangement underwrote America’s rise to superpower dominance” (p. 269).
• Explain how and why fossil fuel consumption played such a key role in America’s rise to dominance following WWII.
• What role has multi-national corporations (many that are American) played in shaping our global economy and environment?
o Explain how and why the political philosophy of neo-liberalism has contributed to their economic dominance?
• What has been the global environmental and social fallout of this global economic arrangement?
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