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Week 3 Response: Alda Yuan

Posted on September 21, 2012 by Alda Yuan

Alda Yuan

Professor Alexandratos

MHC 200

Week 3 Response

The struggle between government regulation and liberty is hardly new or unique to the environmental movement. Every regulation, every law redistributes something, takes power or wealth or liberty from one group and gives it to another, subordinates one interest to another. Even the most basic laws, such as prohibition against thievery are written with the view of putting the interest of societal order above the robber’s liberty to take what he or she wills. Depending on who you ask, environmental regulations are either an example of heavy handed governmental intervention stifling the free market or sorely needed protocols that tip the balance between powerful corporations and individuals.

It cannot be denied that environmental regulations put a burden on business. They force corporations to allocate resources and manpower toward avenues that generate no extra income for the company and open them up to governmental sanctions and legal liability. But it is far from obvious that such a burden is undue. This debate has had a central role in the current presidential election. The slogan of the Republican National Convention for instance was, “We Built It.” This is a linguistic play from a soundbite in which President Obama seemed to declare that business owners did not build their own companies. In reality, he was referring to the public goods such as roads made available and maintained by the government. But the distinction here is almost immaterial because the crux of the matter is that no one truly builds anything on their own. Even if an entrepreneur takes no loans from the government and accepts no help from family members, they cannot claim to have received no aid.

Free enterprise itself is only possible because the government provides a mechanism by which private contracts can be enforced and intellectual property protected. Public schools provide people the basic literacy and arithmetic needed to run even the simplest of businesses. The military might and diplomatic leverage of the country enable our goods and people to travel to and through other countries without hindrance. So while it might be politically expedient to declare businesses owners are all ubermensch, it remains a gross oversimplification. This is not to detract from the hard work and innovation people bring to the free market. And indeed, regulation should not be so onerous as to strangle this. Any country that wants to continue to be an economic power needs people who are motivated, dedicated and ambitious. The strength of a capitalist system is the power of profit as an incentive to continuously develop and improve. But, as the founders might have said, wealth and power come with the responsibility to act with virtue.  At the very least, it means not harming the communities from which you derive benefit. And government regulations, while doubtless cumbersome to follow a times, promote the general welfare. Despite the suspicions of our founding fathers for government authority, they understood this principle. In his “Thoughts on Government”, which would serve as the framework for the Massachusetts Constitution and thus for the Constitution of the United States, John Adams said “the form of government which communicates ease, comfort, security, or, in one word, happiness, to the greatest number of persons, and in the greatest degree, is the best.” Of course, he was arguing for a republican form of government but this utilitarian view of the role of government more than provides justification for intervention in areas where private entities have infringed upon the liberty and comfort of others.

Weekly Response 2: Alda Yuan

Posted on September 16, 2012 by Alda Yuan

Between the assertions of the environmental ethics movement and the discoveries of modern physics, the old Scientific Revolution conception of planet Earth as a machine has taken some major hits. New evidence, like the discovery of the effect of micro-plankton upon the water cycle testifies to the degree of complexity and interconnectedness of the processes and species that make up our biosphere. Each new discovery seems to give more strength to that old Greek idea of the planet as a whole living organism. Thus, what impacts one element of the global web reverberates throughout the rest of it.

This concept is very pertinent to the subject of water pollution in urban environments. Water is undoubtedly a public good and its use is often, like many other common goods, affected by the tragedy of the commons. When an individual or a company dumps toxins or garbage into the water, it affects the water quality of everyone else in the vicinity. And when everyone participates in this irresponsible activity, the common good is not only tainted but can be utterly destroyed. A good example is the bay at Rio de Janeiro, which has become so polluted as to be essentially a reservoir of human waste and industrial chemicals. The fact that this has not been resolved even with two major international events coming in the near future is a tragic testament to society’s inherent inertia. Bereft of any decent public campaign to improve the situation or sense of social responsibility on the part of many government officials, the situation has become worse and worse. This again, is a problem with the cultural mindset. It is hard to imagine a community would not band together in an effort to preserve something as basic as their living conditions and health. But at the same time, it is not surprising given the reluctance members of our own society have shown towards giving support to such issues within our own borders.  The wastewater treatment in our city is of course to be lauded when compared with Rio de Janeiro but that is no cause to cease innovating, researching and trying to find better solutions.  In fact, perhaps the example of places like Brazil should inspire us to think about our own actions.

The streets of Manhattan are after all, far from sparkling clean. There is no evidence of cancer-inducing cyanobacteria but how likely is it that all the litter and waste on our streets and in our alleys does not foster bacteria growth? And then of course there is the concrete example of the PCB pollution in the Hudson. While neither the Hudson nor the bay contains filth comparable to the Bay in Rio de Janeiro, the PCB pollution and the long delayed clean up effort demonstrates clearly that we are susceptible to many of the same problems Brazil faces. In our country, as well as theirs, companies often dispose of their waste in the most economic way possible. Usually of course, the most economic way for the company turns out to be less than optimal for the community and society at large. That is because economic costs do not take into account social costs. But in reality, economic costs usually defined more narrowly because they include only immediate costs. Long term costs such as the price of depleting supplies are often not even considered. If companies insist on focusing on economic value, the solution would be to make sure businesses somehow internalized the societal as well as economic costs of their actions. But as it seems unlikely any businesses will voluntarily take this responsibility onto themselves, the problem becomes one of how to balance the interests of society with the need to respect rights.

Weekly Response 1: Alda Yuan

Posted on September 4, 2012 by Alda Yuan

As someone who has long been interested in the environment in an abstract and only semi-involved way, the issues and statistics cited in the first lecture were not all that surprising.  They were however, very disturbing and quite sad. As a species, we have a destructive impact on so many different aspects of the environment.  Perhaps that is one of the reasons why the issue is so difficult to gain support for. There just seems to be too many things we have to change about our society and about our lives in order to make a difference in the health of our environment. The movement lacks a single issue or front to act as a clarion call because so many different people advocate for protecting different things. An especially salient or especially resounding topic might make it easier for the public to support a cleaner environment and all that entails.

Of course the individual issues that motivate activists to demonstrate and lobby despite all opposition are distinctly important. The resolution of any of those issues would doubtless contribute to the overall health of our ecosystem and surroundings but it is sometimes hard for the citizen without scientific training to follow the train of logic that binds the wellbeing of a distant bay with their own welfare and economic situation or to understand the gravity of the situation revealed by dry statistics and data. This is especially true in recent years with the propaganda campaigns by various special interest groups attempting to discredit climate change and even environmental science as a whole.

In effect, these people have succeeded in turning science into something intensely political whereas being fact based, it should naturally be in the realm of the apolitical. Rather than accept the facts as they are and simply argue for this or that policy in light of them, these groups have succeeded in twisting the very facts themselves. That citizens are willing to accept such corruption of the facts points to a fundamental deficiency in the attitude and norms of our society. Despite all the scientists and activists sounding the warning, the public concern has not yet reached the critical mass necessary for a cultural shift. For it is indeed a cultural shift that seems to be necessary for real environmentalism to take hold.

By this, I don’t mean that society should cease to strive for a high standard of living or give up many of the luxuries that we understand as being a part of modern life. However, the average citizen has at least to be aware of the impact that their actions have on the earth. Only when the conversation shifts away from a discussion of whether or not the environment is worth saving and toward a discussion about how to go about it will things begin to happen. At that point, I think government will be given the authority to step in with regulations and incentives to encourage research and development in green energy and related avenues. At the same time, people will start to make choices such as saving energy and buying more efficient electronics, changes that are small in and of themselves but will perhaps spur the industry toward further development in that direction.

Regarding the concept of deep ecology, I think Naess’ general idea sounds right. I don’t think he means that each organism and each species necessarily must be preserved only that a certain attitude should be taken toward nature. We should recognize that nature and natural creatures and landscapes in a sense, deserve to be preserved. Pragmatism in the judgment of what to do in each specific case still has a place but it is practicality tempered with the knowledge that every decision comes with a sacrifice.

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