Law and Corporate Malfeasance in Neoliberal India

2020 ◽  
Vol 46 (7-8) ◽  
pp. 1157-1171
Author(s):  
Nikhil Deb
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
World Economy ◽  
The Political ◽  
Marginalized Populations ◽  
The World ◽  
Scant Attention ◽  
The Law ◽  
Neoliberal India ◽  
Capitalist Firms

Critical sociolegal scholars highlight how the law favors powerful actors in handling the socioenvironmental devastation affecting marginalized populations. What receives scant attention is how the neoliberalization of the world economy has further enabled powerful capitalist firms to shape the legal path in their own favor and to the detriment of the marginalized. Union Carbide’s 1984 Bhopal catastrophe killed 25,000, injured 600,000, and left prolonged consequences. This paper advances our understanding of the political economy of law by analyzing the handling of death and devastation in Bhopal. Drawing data from 60 interviews with Bhopal victim activists and archives, it advances the argument that the law mirrors the interests of the neoliberal actors of capital. Findings suggest that the law has not only proved unable to safeguard the weakest elements of Bhopal society, but also the pursuit of legal solutions under neoliberalism is incapable of addressing the long-term harms affecting marginalized Bhopalis.

Conclusions

1998 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. W. Rostow
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Economy ◽  
21St Century ◽  
World Economy ◽  
Industrial Revolution ◽  
The United States ◽  
Population Increase ◽  
The Political ◽  
The World ◽  
The Government

I have tried in this book to summarize where the world economy has come from in the past three centuries and to set out the core of the agenda that lies before us as we face the century ahead. This century, for the first time since the mid-18th century, will come to be dominated by stagnant or falling populations. The conclusions at which I have arrived can usefully be divided in two parts: one relates to what can be called the political economy of the 21st century; the other relates to the links between the problem of the United States playing steadily the role of critical margin on the world scene and moving at home toward a solution to the multiple facets of the urban problem. As for the political economy of the 21st century, the following points relate both to U.S. domestic policy and U.S. policy within the OECD, APEC, OAS, and other relevant international organizations. There is a good chance that the economic rise of China and Asia as well as Latin America, plus the convergence of economic stagnation and population increase in Africa, will raise for a time the relative prices of food and industrial materials, as well as lead to an increase in expen ditures in support of the environment. This should occur in the early part of the next century, If corrective action is taken in the private markets and the political process, these strains on the supply side should diminish with the passage of time, the advance of science and innovation, and the progressively reduced rate of population increase. The government, the universities, the private sector, and the professions might soon place on their common agenda the delicate balance of maintaining full employment with stagnant or falling populations. The existing literature, which largely stems from the 1930s, is quite illuminating but inadequate. And the experience with stagnant or falling population in the the world economy during post-Industrial Revolution times is extremely limited. This is a subject best approached in the United States on a bipartisan basis, abroad as an international problem. It is much too serious to be dealt with, as it is at present, as a domestic political football.

The Political Economy of Resources: Africa's Future in the Global Environment

1978 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-32 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy M. Shaw ◽  
Malcolm J. Grieve
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
World Economy ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Global Environment ◽  
The Political ◽  
Foreign Markets ◽  
Absolute Increase ◽  
Primary Products ◽  
The World ◽  
Relative Decline

Africa has become more reliant – not less – on exports of primary products and raw materials and on imports of finished and semifinished goods since independence… the fact that Africa's role in the world economy has undergone a relative decline at the same time as dependence on foreign markets, goods and capital has experienced an absolute increase is evidence that the gap between Africa and the industrialised world is growing, despite the ambitious efforts of African states to close it.1

Chapter II. The World Economy

1990 ◽  
Vol 131 ◽  
pp. 24-46
Author(s):  
R.J. Barrell ◽  
Andrew Gurney ◽  
Stephen Dulake
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
World Economy ◽  
Potential Effect ◽  
The Political ◽  
The World ◽  
East German ◽  
Economic Developments ◽  
Open Markets

The most important factor affecting our view of long-term prospects is the potential effect of developments in Eastern Europe. Since our last forecast, which was completed three months ago on 9th November 1989 the political map of Europe has changed. The Czechs, Rumanians and Bulgarians appear to have joined the Poles and the Hungarians in the drive for democracy and more open markets. The collapse of the East German regime, and the gathering pace of the drive for unification with the FDR has been even more remarkable. Almost any possible outcome will change the prospects for growth and economic developments in the whole of the non-Communist world. We would argue that these effects will not just be confined to Continental Europe.

Coal's Persistence in the Capitalist World-Economy

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 194-221 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul K. Gellert ◽  
Paul S. Ciccantell
Keyword(s):  
World Economy ◽  
Industrial Revolution ◽  
Energy Transition ◽  
Ecological Modernization ◽  
World Systems ◽  
Coal Consumption ◽  
The World ◽  
Capitalist World Economy ◽  
Capitalist World

Predominant analyses of energy offer insufficient theoretical and political-economic insight into the persistence of coal and other fossil fuels. The dominant narrative of coal powering the Industrial Revolution, and Great Britain's world dominance in the nineteenth century giving way to a U.S.- and oil-dominated twentieth century, is marred by teleological assumptions. The key assumption that a complete energy “transition” will occur leads some to conceive of a renewable-energy-dominated twenty-first century led by China. After critiquing the teleological assumptions of modernization, ecological modernization, energetics, and even world-systems analysis of energy “transition,” this paper offers a world-systems perspective on the “raw” materialism of coal. Examining the material characteristics of coal and the unequal structure of the world-economy, the paper uses long-term data from governmental and private sources to reveal the lack of transition as new sources of energy are added. The increases in coal consumption in China and India as they have ascended in the capitalist world-economy have more than offset the leveling-off and decline in some core nations. A true global peak and decline (let alone full substitution) in energy generally and coal specifically has never happened. The future need not repeat the past, but technical, policy, and movement approaches will not get far without addressing the structural imperatives of capitalist growth and the uneven power structures and processes of long-term change of the world-system.

The New Terrain of International Law

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen J. Alter
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Political Influence ◽  
The Political ◽  
International Courts ◽  
Constitutional Review ◽  
Delegation Of Authority ◽  
The World ◽  
The Law

In 1989, when the Cold War ended, there were six permanent international courts. Today there are more than two dozen that have collectively issued over thirty-seven thousand binding legal rulings. This book charts the developments and trends in the creation and role of international courts, and explains how the delegation of authority to international judicial institutions influences global and domestic politics. The book presents an in-depth look at the scope and powers of international courts operating around the world. Focusing on dispute resolution, enforcement, administrative review, and constitutional review, the book argues that international courts alter politics by providing legal, symbolic, and leverage resources that shift the political balance in favor of domestic and international actors who prefer policies more consistent with international law objectives. International courts name violations of the law and perhaps specify remedies. The book explains how this limited power—the power to speak the law—translates into political influence, and it considers eighteen case studies, showing how international courts change state behavior. The case studies, spanning issue areas and regions of the world, collectively elucidate the political factors that often intervene to limit whether or not international courts are invoked and whether international judges dare to demand significant changes in state practices.

New and not so new strategies in promoting integrity with particular reference to Africa

2018 ◽  
pp. 38-74
Author(s):  
Barry Rider
Keyword(s):  
World Economy ◽  
Intelligence Community ◽  
Generational Change ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
The World ◽  
The Will ◽  
The Law ◽  
Financial Intelligence ◽  
New Strategies

This article is focused on exploration not merely proposed developments in and refinements of the law and its administration, but the very significant role that financial intelligence can and should play in protecting our societies. It is the contention of the author that the intelligence community at large and in particular financial intelligence units have an important role to play in protecting our economies and ensuring confidence is maintained in our financial institutions and markets. In this article the author considers a number of issues pertinent to the advancement of integrity and in particular the interdiction of corruption to some degree from the perspective of Africa. The potential for Africa as a player in the world economy is enormous. So far, the ambiguous inheritance of rapacious empires and the turmoil of self-dealing elites in post-colonial times has successfully obscured and undermined this potential. Indeed, such has been the mismanagement, selfishness and importuning that many have grave doubts as to the ability of many states to achieve an ordered transition to what they could and should be. South Africa is perhaps the best example of a society that while avoiding the catastrophe that its recent past predicted, remains racked by corruption and mismanagement. That there is the will in many parts of the continent to further stability and security by addressing the cancer of corruption, the reality is that few have remained or been allowed to remain steadfast in their mission and all have been frustrated by political self-interest and lack of resources. The key might be education and inter-generational change as it has been in other parts of the world, but only an optimist would see this coming any time soon – there is too much vested interest inside and outside Africa in keeping things much as they are! The author focuses not so much on attempting to perfect the letter of the law, but rather on improving the ways in which we administer it.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document