Social Problems in a Global Context

The environment has been a cause of global concern for many decades, as it is the basis on which society is built and on which economies function. Without the environment, society cannot exist. While in the past, talking about the environment meant coming up with new ways to exploit natural resources, in recent years, talk about the environment has turned to sustainability. What I wish to talk about in this essay is the link between society and the environment, and a certain irony in Sinagapore being a “clean and green” country.

The concept of environmental sociology was birthed following the global environmental movement in the 1960’s and early 1970’s. It was based on the use of sociology to explain environmental conditions that could have caused social phenomena. One theory that has come out of this is the theory of existential dualism, showing that the “duality of the human condition rests with cultural uniqueness and evolutionary traits”. Therefore we see that humans have the ability to engineer, improve, or wreck the boundaries of our natural environment, and is it this aspect on which environmental sociology focuses on. Another thoery that has emerged and is more salient in today’s world is the societal-environmental dialectic. One of this theory’s aspects highlight the problem of the desire for economic expansion over ecological/sociological concerns.¹

One movement that has come out of the world’s search for a sustainable environment is the concept of Fair trade. It is an “organised social movement and market-based approach to enpowering developmint country producers and promoting sustainability”². This movement does advocate societal and environmental standards in areas related to the production of a ‘fair trade’ good or goods. Why this is counted in the movement of enviromental sustainability is because it has gained a number of followers, both producer and buyer alike, to participate in it’s movement. Also, more fair trade products are seen being marketed around the world, in brands such as Starbucks, Accessorise, and Marks and Spencer. However to me, I feel that not much is being done in Singapore about the promotion of fair trade products. Somehow it appears to be as if our government is not as interested in promoting global equity, as opposed to sustaining our own country. While I know that is it crucial that as a country we have to be environmentally sustainable, it is also in our ultimate interests to advocate global environmental sustainability.

The environmental sustainability scene in Singapore is of interest to me, not because I declare myself to be a raving fanatic over saving the environment, but because it is rather ironic to see the ways in which Singaporeans try to sustain the environment yet fail miserably, sometimes out of good intent, sometimes out of pure ignorance. One such example is the use of plastic bags in supermarkets and most shops. While this may seem like a cliche andmuch discussed topic so, I for a fact know that in my neighbourhood supermarket, BYOB( Bring Your Own Bag) Wednesday has little effect on the supermarket crowd. I myself try as much to stuff the items that I buy into whatever bag I’m carrying at that particular moment in time but what I wish to highlight is the hurried stuffing of my purchased items into the readily hanging plastic bags by the cashier. Perhaps what we need is not just a change of minset among the consumers but also the people who are the transition point between provider and consumer, for example, the supermarket cashier.

Another point of contention would be the apparent juxtaposition of the litter on the ground I see in my lift lobby against the “Nominated again for ‘Our Town Sparkles’”³ plaque so proudly displayed on the wall. I feel that this “sparkling” at any rate, is not achieved by the residents themselves but instead, by the cleaners that the town council hires. After all, how often do you see a Singaporen picking up his fellow citizen’s carelessly disposed rubbish and throwing it into the bin? The point that i’m trying to show here is the fact that at times like this, caring for the environment through disposing of litter properly may not be done by the citizens of a country themselves but instead, by hired cleaners often of another nationality. How then can Singapore really pride herself on being a clean and green country when what she has is actually a whole troop of foreign cleaners picking up after her citizens?

Indeed there are a myraid of ways to keep a country and subsequently, the world in enviromental sustaibility, and it is true that ways such as fair trade are being put into place and publicised. Thus I feel that while environmental sustainability is possible, in Singapore’s case it is largely made possible by a paid workforce of foreigners that clean up after us citizens, enduring our blatant ethnocentrism while yet globally claiming credit for have a “sparkling” country.

With this week’s topic about the environment, I just have to say that I CAN’T STAND THE STYROFOAM PLATES AND BOWLS IN CANTEEN B! Yucks. DETEST STYROFOAM. Okay I know that like our school has this whole green movement thing going on, but perhaps yknow they could start with like the removal of disposables in Can B and giving us real plates and utensils instead of those gross styofoam stuff. When I first came to ntu I already wasn’t like loving it at first sight but this styrofoam thing just managed to irk me more. So much for being a GREEN campus as they proudly proclaim. Yeah well, no lack of green grass and trees, but instead, plenty of disposable stuff in can b.

Maybe can b is destined to be the gross food part of ntu forever. I mean, if there’s good food it should be served on a proper plate right? (for example CANTEEN A’S foodcourt) Not on lousy styrofoam plates that make screechy noises. Oh yes and the macs at can a loves to give students their food in a plastic bag. I dont see why they should do so since they have like multitudes of students sitting at the tables there and consuming their food like ON THE VERY SPOT! Why not a tray then?! And they looked at me like I was some weirdo when I asked for a tray the other time.

Okay I’m just kinda irritated that Can b uses styofoam plates. Maybe I should start bringing my own chopsticks (yes I know chopsticks and plates are two very different items) to school! HAHA.

Enough ranting about crappy styrofoam plates, back to work!

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While listening to Professor Amir talk about technology during lecture last week, I was struck by how intricately society and technology is linked, especially now where many people are into some form of technology or another, be it the internet, mobile phone, computers, etc.

As I thought about the topic of how society and technology are linked, I recalled a movie that I watched recently, titled “Eagle Eye”, a movie incorporating the topic of technology’s impact on society and politics. In the movie, Jerry Shaw, a disillusioned university drop-out is suddenly summoned by a voice over the phone to do her bidding and if he does not comply, he will most ultimately face death. Another woman, Rachel Holloman, is also summoned by the same mysterious woman and told that if she disobeys her commands, her young son will die. Central to this whole movie is the voice of the mysterious woman, who is later revealed to be a super computer by the name of ARIA. ARIA was developed by the American government, which can oversee and control virtually anything electronic. Her prowess is shown when she seamlessly orchestrates a whole series of narrow escapes for Jerry and Rachel.

The movie is about how ARIA seems to take on a life of her own, and after being ignored by the president to abort an earlier mission which in the end killed many innocent lives, she has decided to take matter into her own hands and planned Operation Gullotine, in which she plots to kill the entire Cabinet.

What I feel is salient about this movie is the fact that even though technology (in the form of ARIA) is developed and controlled by humans, and constituted of programmed elements, it had somehow taken on the form of a human who had the ability to think and plan ahead. This is unlike many other computer programmes which have zero ability to do so. The resulting control of ARIA on the entire country’s electronic systems is a slightly ludicrous yet jarring result of the devastation that could be potentially wrecked on society. Although this degree if control by super computers is perhaps not functional in our world today, it is true that we are increasingly programming computers to do work for us. However, what this mean for society is that we will also have to deal with any negative impacts that might follow it. For example, during industrialisation, many workers were displaced due to the increasing automation of machines in factories. We can see that this increases inequality between those who can afford technology and use it to their benefit, and those who are getting the short end of the stick by getting replaced by technology.

After watching the movie, I was particularly struck by how ARIA was built to function accordingly to society’s needs. This ties in with the point that Professor Amir brought up during lecture, about how technology mirrors society and “reproduce and embody the complex interplay of professional, technical, economic, and political factors”. This is true as I saw from “Eagle Eye” that ARIA was built for all of those above reasons, especially to maintain economic and political order and progress. In this way, we see that technology mirrors our society and the way it changes. For example, if a particular society is introduced to wireless surfing, mobile phone companies are then more presurred to create a new phone that lets the user surf the internet on wireless. In this way, the sociological impact is such: that because of the exchange of idea between society and technology, society determines the direction in which technology should go. Then and again, this question can be brought up: Who then in society, determines these changes?

Is it the government or the common people? Or maybe even those who are the brains behind the extensive research and development? In the case of ARIA, it was the government who birthed the concept and created her. As such, we can say that ARIA was created to serve the governmen’t purpose of maintaning political power and most importantly, social order in everyday life. However, a twist in the plot shows us that when ARIA is capable of thinking on her own, she dictates that revenge must be taken on the cabinet by “the people of America”. What is interesting is that she single handedly takes on the identity of all American citizens as a whole, and although society is unaware of such, she uses this collective identity to go against the government, effectively ruining the government’s plan of using her a tool of political power.

I feel the heart of the issue is not whether super computers should or should not be built, but the fact that no matter how the state may try to seperate technology and society, it can never be done. Both are interlinked, serving each other’s purposes, and without one there cannot be the other.

After reading the chapter on ‘Work: The Global Assembly Line’ in Sernau (2006), one thing that impacted me greatly was the abuse of certain groups of workers, such as those who work in poor working conditions with a minimal pay and no benefits such as healthcare or overtime pay available. Besides poor working conditions, most workers are only taught to do one specific thing or one specific process. This results in the division of labor, a concept that Adam Smith believed to be the “key to prosperity”. However, the downside of this was that the worker acquired only one specific skill in his or her entire working life. If the manufacturing plant or factory closed down, the worker would effectively be out of a job, and would then have a hard time searching for a new job, simply because he had no prior skills and all he learnt was that one specific process. Also, the repetitive and deskilled process that the worker did each day probably meant zilch to him and his fellow workers, as they would not be able to afford the finished product, or may not even know what the assembled product was for.

My opinion on this it that while Marx’s extremely critical views on this division of labor has a basis of truth in it, at the same time, Smith’s reasoning for it being the “key to prosperity” was also true. There is an insatiable demand for efficiency in the workforce, and so a consequence of trying to achieve that is the engaging of workers in repetitive and meaningless tasks. Some workers are impersonally seen as just mere parts in a machine. When a part wears out, another part can be easily put in its place at the same price. This is why wages for these workers are decreasing and welfare disregarded.

Now please don’t be hating me, but I have to say that the reason why there are such instances of abuse of workers worldwide, especially in countries like Mexico, Africa, Pakistan and India, is us. Yes, us, the consumers, who demand quality and hanker after cheap prices. As consumers who buy different kinds of products and know how to shop wisely, when we see two products of the same quality side by side, we will pick the cheaper one. An example that was highlighted in Sernau (Pg 46) would be that of jeans in America. Initially, Levi’s insisted on keeping it’s reputation of being ‘All-American’, and manufactured their jeans solely in America. However, driven by the insanely low prices that its competitors had, it was forced to relocate its manufacturing plants overseas, where labor costs and other factors of production were cheaper. Therefore we see an instance where in order to make their brand more appealing to the consumer market in terms of pricing, Levi’s lowered their retail price and the accompanying method was to shift its manufacturing plants overseas – where labor was considerably cheaper.

In my opinion, this makes the consumer market the driving force behind the ill treatment of workers and even child labor. However, some of us may just not realize this, due to the fact that we fail to see the processes that are behind our cup of Starbucks coffee, the Gap clothes that we wear, the fast food that we eat. Nowadays, interaction between the consumer and the producer is such that we never see who makes the products. Yes, we do see the barista that brews our overpriced coffee, but we don’t see the workers that grow and harvest the coffee beans, do we? Even now, plantation workers are being paid the minimum wage just because companies wish to maximize their profit. Certain companies try to make things slightly more positive by ensuring that they engage in fair trade and labeling their products “Fair Trade Certified” to let consumers know that the people who supplied their raw materials were guaranteed a better deal.

It is indeed a vicious cycle of the consumer and producer each wanting personal gains, with the result of the laboring workers having their wages being constantly cut and their welfare in total disregard. Corny as this may sound, my hope for the future is that consumers learn how to be more discerning and the companies that abuse their workers, both child and adult, will find an economic reason to stop, because if anything makes sense to them, it’s got to be money and profit.