Globalisation, Green Crime, Human Rights and State Crime Flashcards

Question

SOUTH (2008)– PRIMARY AND SECONDARY GREEN CRIME

Answer 1

Nigel South distinguishes between two types of green crime. primary green crime secondary green crime

Answer 2

crimes of air poloution crimes of water polloution crimes of animals crimes of deforestation

Answer 3

Burning fossil fuels from industry and transport adds 6 billion tons of carbon to the atmosphere every year, and carbon emissions are growing at about 2% a year. According to **Walters (2013) twice as many people die from air pollution induced breathing problems than 20 years ago.**

Answer 4

Between 1960 and 1990 1/5 of the world’s tropical rainforest was destroyed. For example, in the Amazon the forest has been cleared to rear beef cattle for export, and in the Andes the ‘war on drugs’ has led to pesticide spraying which has caused food crops to be destroyed and drinking water to be contaminated.

Answer 5

50 species a day are becoming extinct, and 46% of mammals are currently at risk. 70-95% if the earth’s species live in the rainforests which are under severe threat. This crime also includes animals, and animal parts trafficking.

Answer 6

Half a billion people lack access to clean drinking water, and around 25million people die annually from drinking contaminated water. Marine pollution threatens 58% of the worlds ocean reefs, and 34% of its fish.

Answer 7

Date: April 20, 2010 Location: Gulf of Mexico Event: The Deepwater Horizon, a drilling rig operated by BP, exploded and sank. Cause: A blowout occurred in the Macondo Prospect oil well, releasing oil from the ocean floor. Scale: Over 200 million gallons (approx. 4.9 million barrels) of oil spilled into the Gulf over 87 days. It's the largest marine oil spill in history. 1. Marine Life Damage 2. Ecosystem Destruction 3. Food Chain Disruption 4. Oil Dispersants

Answer 8

1. Marine Life Damage Fish, dolphins, sea turtles, and birds were killed or injured by oil exposure. The spill disrupted reproduction in many species, especially shrimp and oyster populations. Long-term health effects on marine animals, including tumors and organ damage, were observed. 2. Ecosystem Destruction Fragile ecosystems like coral reefs, wetlands, and mangroves were contaminated. Oil suffocated plant roots, leading to erosion of wetlands which are natural storm buffers. 3. Food Chain Disruption Tiny organisms at the base of the food chain (like plankton) were poisoned. The effects rippled up to impact larger predators and even human seafood industries. 4. Oil Dispersants BP used nearly 2 million gallons of chemical dispersants (like Corexit) to break up the oil. These chemicals made the oil harder to see and clean, and some were toxic to marine life.

Answer 9

* Secondary green crimes are further crimes that are committed as a result of ignoring or bending environmental laws designed to prevent or regulate environmental disasters * They are crimes that come out of the conflict between humans and the environment, but are not defined as harm to the environments.

Answer 10

STATE VIOLENCE AGAINST OPPOSITIONAL GROUPS HAZARDOUS WASTE AND ORGANISED CRIME

Answer 11

States condemn terrorism, but they must be prepared to resort to similar illegal methods themselves. eg 1985: Sinking of the Greenpeace ship - Rainbow Warrier by French Secret Service in NZ after they had been protesting about green crime: French Nuclear Weapons testing in the Pacific

Answer 12

Disposing of toxic waste from chemical, nuclear and other industries is highly profitable. Because to dispose it legally is expensive, businesses may seek to dispose of it illegally. For example, in Italy, eco-mafias profit from illegal dumping, much of it at sea. Illegal dumping has a globalised element – for example in the 2004 tsunami, hundreds of barrels of radioactive waste washed up on the shores of Somalia.

Answer 13

**Situ & Emmons (2000)** define environmental crime as ‘an unauthorised act or omission that violates the law’. Like other traditional approaches in criminology, this approach is interested in the patterns and causes of law breaking.

Answer 14

An advantage of this approach is that it has clearly defined boundaries for what is classed as environmental crime. However, it only accepts official definitions of environmental crime which are often shaped by powerful groups such as big corporations to serve their own interests.

Answer 15

**White (2008)** argues that environmental crime is any action that harms the physical environment and/or humans and animals within it, even if no law has been broken Many of the worst environmental harms are not illegal, so the subject matter for green criminology is much wider than for traditional criminology For this reason, green criminology is considered a form of **transgressive criminology** - it transgresses (oversteps) the boundaries of traditional criminology to include new issues This approach is known as **‘zemiology’**, meaning ‘the study of harms’

Answer 16

An advantage of this approach is that because it moves away from legal definitions, it can develop a global perspective on environmental harm. This approach is similar to the Marxist view on ‘crimes of the powerful’, in that environmental law represents the people in powers’ interests – nation states and large corporations are able to define what counts as unacceptable environmental harm.

Answer 17

Date: December 2–3, 1984 Location: Bhopal, India Event: A Union Carbide pesticide plant (a U.S. company) leaked over 40 tons of methyl isocyanate (MIC) gas, a highly toxic chemical. Impact: Thousands died instantly, and hundreds of thousands were affected long-term. Health effects included blindness, cancer, respiratory diseases, and birth defects. The area is still contaminated to this day.

Answer 18

The disaster was a result of corporate negligence: poor safety standards, underinvestment in maintenance, and cost-cutting by a Western multinational in a developing country. The victims were poor, marginalized people in the Global South, who had little legal or political power to fight back. White would argue this is a green crime even if it wasn’t prosecuted properly — because it caused massive environmental and social harm.

Answer 19

The gas leak violated multiple safety laws and regulations. The company and its executives ignored warnings and failed to maintain the facility properly. While legal accountability was limited, many of the acts could clearly be defined as criminal negligence, corporate manslaughter, or regulatory violations. From this view, the Bhopal disaster is a traditional environmental crime because laws were broken, and people died as a direct result.

Answer 20

ANTHROPOCENTRIC A ‘human centred’ view of environmental harm. This view assumes that humans have a right to dominate nature for their own means, and put economic growth before the environment. ECOCENTRIC This view sees humans and the environment as interdependent, so that environmental harm hurts humans also. This view sees both humans and the environment as liable to exploitation by capitalism. In general, green criminology adopts this view.

Answer 21

In many ways it is a global crime, as: 1. The process of globalisation has allowed the growth of green crimes - interconnection of nations means that harm to the environment in one part of the world has implications for the rest of the world 2. The planet is a single ecosystem - the damage is increasingly global, rather than local E.g. Atmospheric pollution in one country may cause acid rain to fall in another, poisoning waterways and damaging forests. E.g. An accident in a nuclear industry, such as the one in Chernobyl, Ukraine in 1986 can spread radioactive material over 1000’s of miles.

Answer 22

The Chernobyl disaster, which occurred on 26 April 1986 in Ukraine, was the worst nuclear accident in history. An explosion and fire at the power plant released massive amounts of radioactive particles across the western USSR and Europe. It is one of only two level 7 events on the International Nuclear Event Scale. The cleanup involved over 500,000 workers and cost around £11 billion ($18 billion). While 31 people died during the incident, long-term health effects continue to emerge.

Answer 23

**Beck** (1992) argues that in today’s late modern society, **the massive increase in productivity and technology has created new ‘manufactured risks’** - dangers that we have not encountered before Many of these risks involve damage to the environment and its consequences for humanity e.g. greenhouse gas emissions causing global warming As the risks we face are global, rather than local in nature, Beck argues we now live in a ‘global risk society’.

Answer 24

Over the past 30 years, Texaco (now Chevron) has caused one of the world's worst environmental disasters by dumping billions of gallons of toxic waste and crude oil in forest regions. This has severely polluted soil and water, leading to widespread health issues among local communities, including cancer, birth defects, and miscarriages. Despite a court order to pay $9 billion in damages, Chevron has not cleaned up the contamination or paid the fine, and the pollution continues to harm the rainforest ecosystem.

Answer 25

**Snider** (1991), Marxist, argues states are often reluctant to pass laws and regulations that may affect these big corporations, and will only do so when faced great pressure from the public. They are enforced in a weak manner, calculated to avoid threatening the profits, or employment, or frightening off investors.

Answer 26

**Sutherland** (1983) also points out that like white collar crime, green crime does not carry the same stigma as regular, conventional crimes. This means that even though laws and regulations exist, they may not be enforced as strictly as regular laws against conventional crime.

Answer 27

**Green and Ward** (2012) define it as: *“State crime is any illegal or deviant activity perpetrated by, or with the complicity of state agencies”*

Answer 28

*“Great power and great crimes are inseparable. Economic and political elites can bring death, disease, and loss to tens of thousands with a single decision”. *

Answer 29

**Political Crimes** e.g corruption and censorship (of media, for example). **Crimes By Security and Police Forces** e.g genocide, torture. **Economic Crimes** e.g violations of health and safety laws to increase profits **Social and Cultural Crimes** e.g institutional racism

Answer 30

**‘state initiated’**, where the state initiates, directs or approves corporate crimes e.g. NASA Challenger explosion **‘state facilitated’**, where states fail to regulate and control corporate behaviour, making crime easier e.g. BP oil rig explosion - the companies involved were responsible, but government regulators had failed to oversee the company properly

Answer 31

**Illegal wars** - in all cases other than self-defence, war can only be declared by the UN Security Council. Any other war is illegal according to international law **Crimes committed during war or its aftermath:** e.g. indiscriminate killing of civilians, torture of war criminals, illegally changing the constitution of a country in order for the invading party to take advantage in some way (consistution: set of principles/rules used to organise a country)

Answer 32

This is an example of a genocide – an attempted elimination of a social group by mass murder of people, normally carried out by state action or with its support. The Holocaust was a genocide committed by Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party which killed around 6 million Jews. From 1941 to 1945, Jews were systematically murdered in the deadliest genocide in history, which was part of a broader aggregate of acts of oppression and killings of various ethnic and political groups in Europe by the Nazi regime. Under the coordination of the SS, following directions from the highest leadership of the Nazi Party, every arm of Germany's bureaucracy was involved in the logistics and the carrying out of the genocide.

Answer 33

This is an example of genocide – the mass murder of a social group, in this case an ethnic group. Rwanda is an African country, a colony of Belgium. The country has two ‘tribes’ – the Tutsi and the Hutu, which are considered to be two different ethnicities, despite speaking the same language, and often inter-marrying. This was a genocidal mass slaughter of Tutsi in Rwanda by members of the Hutu majority government. An estimated 500,000–1,000,000 Rwandans were killed during the 100-day period from April 7 to mid-July 1994, constituting as many as 70% of the Tutsi and 20% of Rwanda's total population

Answer 34

This is an example of state-corporate crime, state crimes that are committed in conjunction with a corporation – in this case, NASA. The challenger space shuttle disaster is an example of state initiated corporate crime. This occurs when states initiate, direct, or approve corporate crimes. In the case of the challenger, risky, negligent and cost cutting decisions by the state agency NASA led to the explosion that killed astronauts 73 seconds after blast off. and a civillain was killed

Answer 35

The Iraq War began in 2003 with a U.S.-led invasion to eliminate alleged weapons of mass destruction, which were never found. The war led to the fall of Saddam Hussein and triggered years of violence, including the rise of ISIS. Although U.S. combat troops withdrew in 2011, instability persists. The conflict caused massive loss of life, displacement, and lasting political and social turmoil in the region.

Answer 36

Some people argue that state crime should be defined by domestic law – laws set out by the government. If an act by the government breaks their own laws, then it is counted as a state crime. ao3 However, does not take into account the fact that the state have the power to implement and not implement certain laws. They are not going to implement laws that are going to incriminate them!

Answer 37

**Michalowski** (1985) argues that state crime should be defined by the amount of harm it causes, whether or not it has broken the law or not. ao3 However, some argue that the notion of ‘harm’ is too vague. What is a ‘harm’? What one person may consider to be a harm, another may not. It is subjective.

Answer 38

Thus, labelling theory argue that state crime should be defined by societies reaction to it – if society decides to label what the government has done as a crime, then it is a crime, regardless of whether or not it has broken the law. ao3 Like the social harms definition, this definition is very vague. Also, sometimes societies reaction to a state crime is manipulated by the media and the government through propaganda, meaning their perception of events / ‘state crimes’ are altered.

Answer 39

**Rothe & Mullins** (2008) define state crime as any action by, or on behalf of a state that violates international law and/or a states own law. If a country goes against previous agreements/laws made between multiple countries than it is a state crime. ao3 However, like the laws made by individual states, international law can be a social construction involving the use of power. For example, **Strand and Tuman** (2012) found that Japan sought to overturn the international ban on whaling by concentrating its foreign aid on impoverished ‘micro-states’ to bribe them to vote against the ban.

Answer 40

**Schwendinger & Schwendinger** (1975) argue that we should define state crime as the violating of people's basic human rights by its state or its agents. States that practice imperialism, racism, sexism or economic exploitation are committing crimes because they are denying people of their basic rights. Therefore, any act by the government that breaches an individual's basic human rights is a state crime. ao3 Some countries disagree on what ‘human rights’ are. For example, most countries include include life and liberty, some countries do not include freedom from hunger

Answer 41

This was developed by **Kelman and Hamilton (1989)** It emphasises not rule-breaking, but **conformity to rules.** It is a ‘rule’ to accept authority and instructions from those in power. They suggest **violent states may encourage obedience** from those who are actually committing the immoral acts even though the individual may consider it as deviant and immoral.

Answer 42

1. Authorisation (the gov support and allow it to happen) 2. Dehumanisation 3. Routinisation (just seems like a routine actvity, **Swann** (2001) calls this ‘enclaves of barbarism’ – places or situations where violence is encouraged and rewarded, and the perpetrators of violence can then afterwards leave, returning to everyday life where ordinary social norms prevail.

Answer 43

Bauman (1989) suggests the holocaust was made possible by these three processes. The crimes in the death camps turned into a state approved ‘routine’ administrative task. Those carrying out the genocide went about their work in much the same routine, and detachment as any other job. This type of approach can be applied to many types of state crime, and not just genocide – for example, torture.

Answer 44

**Adorno** et al. (1950) proposed the idea of the authoritarian personality, characterized by unquestioning obedience to authority and admiration for authority figures. This personality type helps explain why some people follow harmful orders. During WWII, many Germans may have developed such traits due to strict and punitive upbringings. Contrary to the belief that only psychopaths commit atrocities, research like Arendt’s (2006) study of Adolf Eichmann suggests that such individuals can appear psychologically normal.

Answer 45

**Cohen** (2006) states that in today’s society, the state has to make a great deal of effort to conceal or justify their state crimes, or to re-label them as not crimes. Their justifications often follow a three stage denial. “It didn’t happen” – the state claims nothing happened. “If it did happen – it is not what you think!” – the state try to say an alternative explanation – e.g self defence. “Even if it is what you say it is, its justified!”

Answer 46

However, Bauman (1989) takes the opposite view, that it was certain features of modern society that made the Holocaust possible: 1. **A division of labour** – each person was responsible for one small task, so no-one felt personally responsible for the atrocity. 2. **Bureaucratisation** – normalised the killing by making it a repetitive and routine job. 3. **Instrumental rationality** – rational, efficient methods were used to achieve a goal. 4. **Science and technology** – Increase in these areas has made state crime more effective and easier to plan and carry out.

Answer 47

State crimes are carried out by powerful people who have an armoury of state agencies at their disposal to cover up information. A lack of official crime statistics/reports. The state have the power to deny, justify or even reclassify their actions. Sociologists will face strong resistance from the state if they attempt to research it, and may prevent or hinder their research through threats, refusal of funding or denying them access to documents and officials.