A Fire in the Global Village: Teaching Ethical Reasoning and Stakeholder Interests Utilizing Tobacco
Lucien J. Dhooge Sue and John Staton Professor of Law
Journal of Legal Studies Education
Volume 29, Issue 1, pages 95–125, Winter / Spring 2012

[T]is a plague, a mischief, a violent purger of goods, lands, health; hellish, devilish and damned tobacco, the ruin and overthrow of body and soul.( Richard Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621), quoted in Philip J. Hilts, Smokescreen 185 (1996))

I. Introduction
Tobacco has been an agricultural staple from the time of the first recorded European encounter with the plant in the fifteenth century.2 The pervasive nature of its cultivation and consumption has made tobacco one of the most profitable crops in world agricultural history.3 World production is estimated at thirteen billion pounds annually, originating in more than one hundred countries.4 This production has flourished, in part, due to the demand for cigarettes, the leading form of tobacco consumed in the global marketplace. The World Health Organization (WHO) has estimated that 1.2 billion people over the age of fifteen are regular cigarette smokers.5 In developed countries, 35 percent of men and 22 percent of women smoke cigarettes on a regular basis.6 In developing countries, 50 percent of men and 9 percent of women smoke cigarettes on a regular basis.7 Globally, smokers consume 5.5 trillion cigarettes every year, which translates into a consumption rate of one thousand cigarettes for every person on the planet.8
This case study examines the role of tobacco in the global marketplace with a primary emphasis on the U.S. tobacco industry. First, the case study examines U.S. government regulation of tobacco products through federal statutes and litigation. Next, it describes the participation of U.S. tobacco companies in the international marketplace with