Earthsummit.Biz: The Corporate Takeover of Sustainable Development

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Summary: Sustainability and Globalization
Review: This book is a brief overview of globalization and environmental "greenwash". The book is organized into two parts. The first part covers legislative aspects of globalization with respect to the UN, the World Bank, GATT, WTO, NAFTA, the IMF and a veritable alphabet soup of similar agencies. The second part introduces the terms "greenwash" and "bluewash" to refer to corporate propaganda aimed at convincing the public that the corporation is more dedicated to the environment or human rights than it really is. The second part also includes examples of marketing materials or program descriptions from specific transnational companies.

I found the first part of the book with its multitude of acronyms rather hard to follow. A few of the ideas in this section were also a little odd, such as when the authors write: "Instead of reducing consumption in the United States...auto corporations built more sport utility vehicles (SUVs), which pump ever-greater amounts of global warming gasses into the atmosphere." Here, the authors seem to assume that auto companies should be more environmentally responsible by refusing to build the product most in demand by customers. But refusing to meet demand out of principle is not a very realistic expectation for us to have from corporate executives. What the authors perhaps meant was that auto companies should not market their SUVs as aggressively, so that consumers might choose other more environmental friendly autos. This section did include a relatively lucid description of the problems of globalization however, where the authors note "Globalization means that communities, workers, consumers and others around the world are feeling the effects of the growing power and reach of transnational corporations every day." If these transnational corporations focus solely on the maximization of profits and do not respect human rights or the environment, then globalization threatens us all.

The case study format of the second section made this section much easier to read. According to the authors, if an organization does any of the following, it qualifies as "greenwash":
--Impress you with tangential projects (such as when a company spends more on advertising its environmental friendliness than on environmental actions)
--Distract you from their destructive products
--Gain your sympathy by adopting environmental lingo
--Avoid regulations claiming they will solve the problem themselves
Organizations focused in this section include: BP, Council for Biotechnology Information, Chevron, Ford, Mitsubishi, Monsanto, the Nuclear Energy Institute, Philip Morris, Southern Company (electricity producer), and Royal Dutch Shell. In addition to whistle-blowing on environmental issues, the authors also use the term "bluewash", referring to the blue of the UN flag, to point out deceptive claims about human rights issues. Companies accused here of "bluewash" include Aventis, Nike, Rio Tinto, the International Chamber of Commerce, Unilever, Norsk Hydro, Bayer, and Eskom. This latter category of deception is not related to the environmental notion of sustainability, but perhaps was included because the authors assume that a global economy cannot be sustainable if human rights are not respected.

The book contains a substantial amount of end material, including endnotes for sources cited, Global Compact Principles and list of participants, Citizens Compact on the United Nations and Corporations, the platform and letters of support for the Alliance for a Corporate-Free U.N., an index, and materials about the Website www.corpwatch.org.