Connie Aiello

Student No. 500447896

Professor Terry Roswell

SOC103

Environmental Racism and Transnational Corporations

“All Americans have a basic right to live, work, play, go to school, and worship in a clean and healthy environment” (Bullard, Dixie xiii). Unfortunately, this is not true for all. Afro-American communities in the South and other visible minorities across the globe, live through the harsh realities of environmental racism every day. (Bullard, Racism 3) In Confronting Environmental Racism, Robert D. Bullard defines environmental racism as:

Racial discrimination in environmental policymaking. It is racial discrimination in the enforcement of regulations and laws. It is racial discrimination in the deliberate targeting of communities of color for toxic waste disposal and the sitting of polluting industries. It is racial discrimination in the official sanctioning of the life-threatening presence of poisons and pollutants in communities of color. And, it is racial discrimination in the history of excluding people of color from the mainstream environmental groups, decision-making boards, commissions, and regulatory bodies. (3)

Environmental justice on the other hand, is a form of environmental equity. It refers to “the equal protection of environmental laws amongst all people, irrespective of their race or social status. (Peluso 389)

With very little influence in decision-making from minority groups, policymakers deliberately target these low-income communities of visible minorities. Environmental racism is evident as the transnational corporations are allowed to dump toxic waste and acquire land to set up polluting industries in these communities. The results are the exposure of children and adults in these communities to thousands of deadly chemicals. (Kapoor, Environmental Justice) These are considered callous actions of “the dominant decision-making processes [and] the actions of governments, corporations, and affluent individuals who play a role in regulatory policy” (Gosine and Teelucksingh 46). Environmental racism has been challenged by the environmental justice movement, originally led only by middle and upper class whites, who were primarily concerned with issues such as wilderness and wildlife preservation, and resource conservation. Since the 1970s, mainstream environmental organizations in North America began to take into consideration the issues of the poor in developed and Third World countries. As a result, these organizations began to include blacks and other minorities (Bullard, Dixie 1). “Indigenous black institutions, organizations, leaders and networks are coming together against polluting industries and discriminatory environmental policies” (1). However, North America is not the only place where environmental racism is an issue. In Confronting Environmental Racism, Bullard states:

Environmental justice struggles have now been extended beyond U.S. borders as threats multiply in the Third World. Many of these threats are beyond the control of the world’s poor nations. Toxic wastes, banned pesticides, ‘recycled’ batteries, and scrap metals are routinely shipped to Third World Nations by multinational corporations.” Bullard then goes on to say that the multinational corporation environmental policies functioning in the Third World are “atrocious” (5).

Transnational corporations (TNCs), also known as multinational corporations (MNCs) have been expanding and growing since the formation of The British East India Company and the Hudson’s Bay Company founded in 1600 and 1670; respectively. By the mid-1980s there was an exponential rise in TNCs. Technological based companies such as IBM, Dell and Apple began to emerge. TNCs now control 70% of world trade and 80% of foreign investment. The global expansion of TNCs has even spread to poorer countries where labour is very cheap. Maximizing profit is still one of the main objectives of transnational corporations. (Kapoor, TNCs) In Confronting Environmental Racism, Bullard states that TNC activity in the Third World is very similar to the activity performed by branch plants in the U.S. “U.S.-based corporations merely reflect the U.S. domestic policy of targeting low-income, disenfranchised communities of color” ( Bullard, Racism 5). In some cases, transnational corporations will not build industrial plants in underdeveloped countries but simply export and dump toxic waste on their land. (Bullard, Racism 19) “The practice of targeting poor communities of color in the Third World for waste disposal and the introduction of risky technologies from industrialized countries are forms of ‘toxic colonialism’…The structure of these industrial plants built in these poor communities, compromises the health of workers and nearby community residents. (19) In Cross-National Environmental Injustice and Human Rights Issues, Francis O. Adeola provides empirical evidence of TNCs/MNCs (multinational corporations) exporting of their toxic waste operations:

Available evidence indicates that annually, millions of tons of hazardous wastes are channeled by MNCs based in core advanced industrial countries to underdeveloped nations of Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean…Over the past 5 years there have been about 300 documented cases of hazardous waste dumping in Eastern Europe, 239 in Asia, 148 in Latin America, and 30 in Africa. Specific cases include dioxin-laden industrial wastes exported from Philadelphia to Guinea and Haiti in 1987; more than 10,000 tonnes of radioactive waste, PCBs…and other toxic elements exported by an Italian firm to the village of Koko in Nigeria; and several other cases involving a systematic dumping of hazardous wastes to these regions. (11)

In other cases, transnational corporations use a form of colonial power. In Cross-National Environmental Injustice and Human Rights Issues, Francis O. Adeola describes TNC operations as “internal colonialism.” Internal colonialism is different from traditional colonialism where the mother country is controlling her colonies from afar. In internal colonialism, the dominant power and the subordinate group coexist in the same society. The oppressed colony, in this case, visible minorities such as people of colour, enter the host’s society involuntarily. Their traditional culture is destroyed by affluent politicians who impose restrictions on them and then disallow them from participating in beauraucratic decisions, which can be associated with environmental racism. (Adeola 8)

In both the cases of The Bhopal Gas Disaster and The Plight of the Ogoni People of Nigeria, environmental racism is illustrated through the operations of transnational corporations, specifically “toxic colonialism” and “internal colonialism”; respectively, and political activism against the corporations through environmental justice is clearly evident in both cases.

Francis O. Adeola in the case of The Plight of the Ogoni People of Nigeria, illustrates a clear example of environmental racism through the operations of transnational corporations; specifically “internal colonialism”. The Ogoni people are one of the most diverse minority ethnic groups in all of Nigeria. Approximately 404 square miles of Ogoniland is rich in natural crude-oil reserves. The indigenous people of the land lead a subsistence lifestyle which consists of farming and fishing. They are dominated by the Ijaws, who are the rulers of the Delta region. Not only are they a subminority within their own nation, they are the minority of their own state. They have been fighting colonial control for just over a hundred years now. Although they are constantly under colonial control, they still demand and fight for civil rights and more recently, environmental justice. By 1972, six oil fields were discovered and yielded a daily output of 200,000 barrels. Much of Nigeria’s wealth comes from Ogoniland and its major fertilizer plant, two oil refineries, a large petrochemical plant, and other oil-servicing companies. Sadly, the people of Ogoniland do not share in its country’s wealth. (Adeola 698) According to a 1995 press release from the Sierra Club, Royal Dutch Shell and other associated TNCs such as Chevron Corporation “have taken $30 billion from Ogoniland, leaving behind ecological devastation, destitution, environmentally induced illnesses, and a shorter life expectancy among the people” (Adeola 698). Although there have been withdrawals of some of these large oil refineries, there is still an absence of basic infrastructures such as roads, electricity, hospitals and schools. The absence of basic infrastructure in Ogoniland described by Adeola, has a striking resemblance to the absence of basic infrastructure as a result of “internal colonialism” in Southern U.S. described by Bullard in his book, Confronting Environmental Racism. Bullard states that “the most polluted urban communities are those with crumbling infrastructure, ongoing economic disinvestment, deteriorating housing, inadequate schools, chronic unemployment, a high poverty rate, and an overloaded healthcare system” (17). In an effort by the TNCs and military of Nigeria to maximize profit, the landscape of Ogoniland has been ruined by oil spills, and emissions of toxic waste and gases. These people are victims of environmental racism, again characterized by poor visible minorities. By the end of the 1990s many Ogoni people had to leave their land. Genocide and the restriction of human rights were being carried out by the transnational corporations with the support of the military run government of Nigeria. In an effort to fight for their environmental and human rights, the Ogoni people formed a group in 1990 known as MOSOP. According to Adeola:

MOSOP was organized to promote the people’s consciousness, empowerment through cultivation of knowledge, resource mobilization and collective efforts to bring about change in their disadvantaged position. The movement was designed to use non violent strategies similar to those of the civil rights movement of the 1960’s in the United States (699).

In January 1993, MOSOP held a peaceful protest against Royal Dutch Shell which included 300,000 people. The political activism of MOSOP against the corporations gained the attention of the United Nations, NGOs, and environmental activist groups. All of the groups showed sympathy and support towards MOSOP’s cause.

Nancy Lee Peluso and Michael Watts in the case of The Bhopal Disaster, illustrates a clear example of environmental racism through the operations of transnational corporations; specifically “toxic colonialism”. Bhopol is the capital of Madhya Pradesh in India, and has a population of 1,836,784. Since it is considered an industrial city, it was attractive for a transnational corporation like Union Carbide to locate there. In 1969, Union Carbide built a plant to manufacture pesticides. Driven by profit, the company expanded its operation and in 1979 began producing and storing a dangerous chemical known as liquid methyl isocyanate (MIC). The government of India was supportive of this activity and allowed the plant to be located next to a heavily populated area (Peluso & Watts 390). This contravened the 1975 Bhopal Development Plan, which stated that hazardous industries should be located in another part of the city which was downwind of the heavily populated area. Notwithstanding that there was knowledge that other companies in developed countries such as Bayer in Germany or DuPont in Texas, did not store this chemical as “the material is too dangerous to store in a tank” (382), Union Carbide went ahead with the storage design in underground storage tanks without regard for the endanger of the people of Bhopal. To make matters worse, the company even failed to build in safety features that were used in a similar plant in West Virginia such as an early warning system of potential leakage. There was no emergency evacuation plan in the event of an accident. (382) The failure to build safety features relates to “toxic colonialism” as stated previously by Bullard in Confronting Environmental Racism. (19) Furthermore, according to Peluso & Watts, the plant in Bhopal “had structurally built-in potentialities for serious risk to the workers and the community” (391). Again, this relates to “toxic colonialism” as stated previously by Bullard. Environmental racism is evident as the transnational corporation selected this site and built their plant surrounded by a community of colour and exposed them to life threatening poisons. (Bullard, Racism 19) On December 3, 1984, the world’s worse industrial accident occurred at the Union Carbide plant. The deadly gas leak killed more than 3,800 people and injured more than 200,000 people. The company was quick to start turning the blame on the victims, claiming that “the large mortality was due to a combination of undernourishment and a lack of education, and poor hygiene among the people affected.” (Peluso & Watts 388) The Indian government was extensively lobbied by the US administration who knew that the Indian government was desperate to attract and maintain foreign investment. This resulted in a settlement that was far less than the claim made by the victim’s organization in Bhopal. Their claim of $10 billion was based on standards in the US. The Indian government reduced the claim to $3 million and the final settlement was $470 million. This barely made a dent on the company’s profit. The annual report in the year after the settlement stated that it was the company’s best year in its 71 year history. It earned $4.88 per share after the cost of the claim which was only $0.43 per share. This is not considered justice for the victims of this environmental disaster. It can be classified as environmental injustice as environmental racism was evident. The victims did not have the protection of environmental laws. Through political favours such as employing relatives of elite politicians and offering monetary bribes to others such as the Chief Minister whose wife was entertained by the corporation on visits to the U.S., the government turned a blind eye towards the corporation’s violation of environmental regulations. (388)

Transnational Corporations must be held accountable for their inhumane operations against visible minorities. Environmental racism can be reduced through effective political activism against the perpetrating corporations including the use of environmental justice. The environmental justice movement attacks the traditional belief that visible minorities are less concerned about the state of their environment. (Bullard, Racism 58). In the case of The Plight of the Ogoni People of Nigeria, environmental justice was illustrated through the amount of support the Ogoni people gained both at a local and national level. In the case of The Bhopal Gas Disaster, the victims sued the corporation. Although the settlement was not that large and personal justice was barely fulfilled; the environmental injustice was brought to justice as United Carbide lost public trust and later had to sell off the majority of its shares to another parent country. (Peluso & Watts, 388) Although the environmental justice movement has vigorously tried to eliminate environmental racism and the destructive operations of transnational corporations operating both in developed and underdeveloped nations, the developed nations and their profit-driven corporations are still taking this important issue lightly. And so, as evident in the two case studies, the down flow from most resistance to least resistance (North to South), or more specifically the down flow of toxic and internal colonization; still continues. (Adeola 702)