Risk and Environmental Victimisation

• Main Author: White, R
• Format: Book Part
• Language: English
• Published: CSIRO Publishing 2012
• Subjects: Studies in Human Society; Political Science; Environmental Politics; Arctic; Global warming
• Online Access: http://www.publish.csiro.au/pid/6581.htm; http://ecite.utas.edu.au/77775

A recent incident in Hungary provides a tragic illustration of what transnational environmental harm really means. A thick red torrent of toxic sludge burst from a reservoir at a metalsplant 100 km south of Budapest in early October 2010. At least nine people died as a result ofthe sludge surge, some went missing and over 100 persons were physically injured as the toxicsubstance flowed into nearby villages and towns. The sludge reached the Danube River severaldays later, from where it could flow into six other European countries - Croatia, Serbia,Romania, Bulgaria, Ukraine and Moldova - before reaching the Black Sea. An ecological andsocial disaster for Hungary thus simultaneously posed an environmental threat to surroundingcountries and their human inhabitants, ecosystems and animal life. What happens in one country can, in many cases, affect people, ecosystems and animalswell beyond that country's borders. Harm and risk of harm are frequently and increasinglytransnational in character. How to interpret, respond to and prevent such events is part of the mandate of soial scientistswith an interest in analysing existing and future threats to environmental well-being. Certainlymatters of time, space and scale are relevant. For example, risks and harms may be director indirect, and their consequences may be felt in the immediate or in the long term. Harmmay be specific to local areas (e.g. threats to certain species, such as coral in the Great BarrierReef) yet manifest as part of a general global pattern (e.g. an effect of wide-scale temperaturechanges affecting coral everywhere). Harm is central, but this may be unintentional (in thesense of being a byproduct of some other agenda) or premeditated (insofar as the negativeoutcome, for some, is foreseen). The demise of polar bears due to the impact of global warmingin the Arctic is an example of the former. The displacement of local inhabitants from their landdue to carbon sequestration schemes is an example of the latter. The intention of this chapter is to explore environmentally related risks by analysing currenttrends and patterns of victimisation including responses to victimisation, from the point ofview of eco-global criminology (White 2011). Rather than being restricted by the limitations ofthe legal/illegal divide, this perspective asserts the precedence of 'the ecological' and ecologicaljustice - the idea that ecological systems should be diverse and productive over time, and thatthere ought to be an equitable and just future for all. This means assessing 'harm' in many different contexts and guises, regardless of legal status and existing institutional legitimations.Questions of risk and potential harm are not simply technical in nature. Rather, as demonstratedin this chapter, risk tends to be apportioned to certain groups of people more than others.Environmental risk and social inequality frequently go hand-in-hand. Moreover, substantivepotential harms are increasing in likelihood as a result of global warming.