Types of green crime

Question 1

environmental harm

Answer 1

1. Anthropocentric or human-centred view: assumes that humans have a right to dominate nature for their own ends. This view is often adopted by nation-states & transnational corporations.
2. Ecocentric view: sees humans & their environment as interdependent, so that environmental harm hurts humans too. This view sees both humans & the environment as liable to exploitation, particularly by global capitalism, & is the view of green criminologists.

Question 2

types of green crime

Answer 2

Primary environmental crimes: Crimes that result directly from the destruction & degradation of the earth’s resources. South identifies 4 main types of primary crime:

Secondary environmental crimes: Crime that grows out of the flouting of rules aimed at preventing or regulating environmental disasters. E.g. governments often break their own regulations & cause environmental harms. South also identifies examples of secondary green crime:

Question 3

Primary

Answer 3

1. Crimes of air pollution: Burning fossil fuels from industry & transport adds 6 billion tons of carbon to the atmosphere every year, contributing to global warming. Potential criminals are governments, business & consumers. According to Walters (2013), twice as many people now die from air pollution induced breathing problems as 20 years ago.
2. Crimes of species decline & animal rights: 50 species a day are becoming extinct. 70-95% of earth’s species live in the rainforests, which are under severe threat. Also trafficking in animals & animal parts as well as old crimes such as dog-fights & badger-bating are on the increase.
3. Crimes of deforestation: Between 1960 & 1990, one 5th of the world’s tropical rainforest was destroyed (e.g. through illegal logging). Criminals include the state & those who profit from forest destruction, such as logging companies & cattle ranchers.
4. Crimes of water pollution: Half a billion people lack access to clean drinking water & 25 million die annually from drinking contaminated water. Marine pollution threatens 58% of the world’s ocean reefs & 34% of its fish. Criminals include businesses that dump toxic waste & governments that discharge untreated sewerage into rivers & seas.

Question 4

Secondary

Answer 4

1. Breaches of health & safety rules: causing disasters such as Chernobyl and Bhopal. E.g. the Deepwater Horizon oil rig disaster in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 where the state failed to regulate & control corporate behaviour & cost-cutting decisions. The rig, leased by BP, exploded & sank, killing 11 workers & causing the largest accidental oil spill in history, with major health, environmental & economic impacts.
   Also, transnational corporations may offload products such as pharmaceuticals (e.g. blood pressure pills & cancer drugs) onto Third World markets after they have been banned on safety grounds in the West.
2. State violence against oppositional groups: States condemn terrorism but they have been prepared to resort to similar illegal methods themselves. E.g. in 1985, the French government secret service blew up the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior when it was in a New Zealand harbour protesting & trying to prevent French nuclear weapons testing near South Pacific islands. The bomb resulted in the ship sinking & killed one crew member trapped on board.
3. Hazardous waste & organised crime: Disposal of toxic waste from the chemical, nuclear & other industries is highly profitable because of the high costs of doing it safely. Because of the high costs of safe & legal disposal, businesses may seek to dispose of such waste illegally. Much is dumped illegally at sea. E.g. in Italy, eco-mafias profit from illegal dumping of toxic waste and 28,500 rusting barrels of radioactive waste lie on the seabed off the Channel Islands, reportedly dumped by UK authorities in the 1950s.
   Illegal waste dumping often has a globalised character. E.g. Fred Bridgland (2006) describes how, after the tsunami of 2004, hundreds of barrels of radioactive waste, illegally dumped by European companies, washed up on the shores of Somalia. In other cases, Western businesses ship their waste to be processed in Third World countries where costs are lower & safety standards often non-existent. E.g. Rosoff et al (1998) the cost of legitimately disposing of toxic waste in the USA is about $2,500 a ton, but some Third World countries will dispose of it for $3 a ton.

Question 5

evaluation of green criminology

Answer 5

It recognises the growing importance of environmental issues & the need to address the harms & risks of environmental damage, both to humans & non-human animals.

However, by focusing on the much broader concept of harms rather than simply on legally defined crimes, it is hard to define the boundaries of its field of study clearly. Defining these boundaries involves making moral or political statements about which actions ought to be regarded as wrong. Critics argue that this is a matter of values & cannot be established objectively.