Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
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Chapter 4: The toxic cradle of productionA related and equally ominous result is that producers remained free to produce andrelease into our environments an ever growing number of chemicals – most of <strong>the</strong>mnever tested for harmfulness. Jack Doyle, <strong>the</strong> chronicler of Dow Chemical’s history,writes that “only about 700 of <strong>the</strong> existing registered 100,000 chemicals used in globalcommerce have complete toxicological profiles” [2004: 11]. Regulators fight a losingbattle, often against active resistance from chemical manufacturers, to identify dangersfrom chemicals and regulate against <strong>the</strong>m.Paint it greenA crisis of capital in <strong>the</strong> 1970s, associated with <strong>the</strong> US defeat in Vietnam and <strong>the</strong>subsequent ‘oil shocks’, led to a major restructuring of <strong>the</strong> organisation of productionstarting in <strong>the</strong> 1980s. This is generally described as a shift from Fordist to post-Fordistproduction. Fordism concentrated and integrated <strong>the</strong> production chain within singlecorporations to mass produce standard products whereas post-Fordism organisesproduction through global networks of firms dominated by leading transnationalcorporations. 57Networked production has its origin in <strong>the</strong> East Asian economies and Japan inparticular. It introduced a range of innovations to cut production costs such as ‘just intime’ delivery of inputs and ‘total quality management’ aimed at ‘zero defect’ in goodsproduced. The concept of zero waste, according to industrial economist Robin Murray,is an extension of zero defect and derives, on <strong>the</strong> one hand, from <strong>the</strong> pressures exertedby <strong>the</strong> environmental movement and, on <strong>the</strong> o<strong>the</strong>r, from “<strong>the</strong> world of industry andits rethinking of production” [2002: 19]. Zero waste, he argues, is central to <strong>the</strong> post-Fordist “wave of industrial development … centred on electronics” and “marked notso much by a new material … as by <strong>the</strong> pressure to reduce materials and <strong>the</strong>ir toxicity… We live in an age [that] speaks of ‘dematerialisation’, of finding ways of avoidingproduction, of making more with less” [69]. And he goes on to applaud <strong>the</strong> WorldBusiness Council for Sustainable Development’s (WBCSD) leadership in promoting‘eco-efficiency’.Murray emphasises <strong>the</strong> role of social movements and government regulation inushering in a new paradigm of ‘post-industrial’ production with design for inbuilt reuse,upgrading and recycling etc. But finally it is corporate capital that leads this wave57 See The groundWork Report 2003 for a more detailed discussion on <strong>the</strong> restructuring of production.<strong>Wasting</strong> <strong>the</strong> <strong>Nation</strong> - groundWork - 81 -