Environmental Homogenization or Heterogenization? The Effects of Globalization on Carbon Dioxide Emissions, 1970–2014

Globalization significantly influences climate change. Ecological modernization theory and world polity theory suggest that globalization reduces carbon dioxide emissions worldwide by facilitating economic, political, social, and cultural homogenization, whereas ecological unequal exchange theory indicates that cumulative economic and political disparities lead to an uneven distribution of emissions in developed and less developed countries. This study addresses this controversy and systematically investigates the extent to which different dimensions of globalization influence carbon emissions in developed and less developed countries by treating globalization as a dynamic historical process involving economic, political, and social/cultural dimensions in a long-term, cross-national context. Drawing on data for 137 countries from 1970 to 2014, we find that while globalization, social and cultural globalization in particular, has enabled developed countries to significantly decrease their carbon emissions, it has led to more emissions in less developed countries, lending support to the ecological unequal exchange theory. Consistent with world polity theory, international political integration has contributed to carbon reductions over time. We highlight the internal tension between environmental conservation and degradation in a globalizing world and discuss the opportunities for less developed countries to reduce emissions.

Breaking Ships in the World-System: An Analysis of Two Ship Breaking Capitals, Alang-Sosiya, India and Chittagong, Bangladesh

Centrality in the world-system allows countries to externalize their hazards or environmental harms on others. Core countries, for instance, dump heavy metals and greenhouse gases into the global sinks, and some of the core's hazardous products, production processes and wastes are displaced to the (semi) peripheral zones of the world-system. Since few (semi) peripheral countries have the ability to assess and manage the risks associated with such hazards, the transfer of core hazards to the (semi) periphery has adverse environmental and socio-economic consequences for many of these countries and it has spawned conflict and resistance, as well as a variety of other responses. Most discussions of this risk globalization problem have failed to situate it firmly in the world-system frame emphasizing the process of ecological unequal exchange. Using secondary sources, I begin such a discussion by examining the specific problem of ship breaking (recycling core-based ocean going vessels for steel and other materials) at the yards in Alang-Sosiya, India and Chittagong, Bangladesh. Attention centers on the nature and scope of ship breaking in these two locations, major drivers operating in the world-system, adverse consequences, the unequal mix of costs and benefits, and the failure of existing political responses at the domestic and international levels to reduce adequately the adverse consequences of ship breaking.