A creative and comprehensive exploration of the institutional forces undermining the management of environments critical to public health.
For almost two decades, the citizens of western Mexico have called for a cleanup of the Santiago River, a water source so polluted it emanates an overwhelming acidic stench. Toxic clouds of foam lift off the river in a strong wind. In Sewer of Progress, Cindy McCulligh examines why industrial dumping continues in the Santiago despite the corporate embrace of social responsibility and regulatory frameworks intended to mitigate environmental damage. The fault, she finds, lies in a disingenuous discourse of progress and development that privileges capitalist growth over the health and well-being of ecosystems.
Rooted in research on institutional behavior and corporate business practices, Sewer of Progress exposes a type of regulatory greenwashing that allows authorities to deflect accusations of environmental dumping while “regulated” dumping continues in an environment of legal certainty. For transnational corporations, this type of simulation allows companies to take advantage of double standards in environmental regulations while presenting themselves as socially responsible and green global actors. Through this inversion, the Santiago and other rivers in Mexico have become sewers for urban and industrial waste. Institutionalized corruption, a concept McCulligh introduces in the book, is the main culprit, a system that permits and normalizes environmental degradation, specifically in the creation and enforcement of a regulatory framework for wastewater discharge that prioritizes private interests over the common good.
Through a research paradigm based in institutional ethnography and political ecology, Sewer of Progress provides a critical, in-depth look at the power relations subverting the role of the state in environmental regulation and the maintenance of public health.
Conditions of Use
This book is licensed under a Creative Commons License (CC BY-NC-SA). You can download the ebook Sewer of Progress for free.
- Title
- Sewer of Progress
- Subtitle
- Corporations, Institutionalized Corruption, and the Struggle for the Santiago River
- Publisher
- The MIT Press
- Author(s)
- Cindy Mcculligh
- Published
- 2023-07-25
- Edition
- 1
- Format
- eBook (pdf, epub, mobi)
- Pages
- 356
- Language
- English
- ISBN-10
- 0262545926
- ISBN-13
- 9780262374934
- License
- CC BY-NC-SA
- Book Homepage
- Free eBook, Errata, Code, Solutions, etc.
Contents Acknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction: From “Mexican Niagara” to River of Death I.1 Setting the Scene 1: Arriving at the River I.2 Setting the Scene 2: Of Myths and Power I.3 Welcome to the Santiago River I.4 How to Create a Sewer of Progress I.5 Green Mirages: Market Environmentalism for Poor Countries I.6 Institutionalized Corruption I.7 Research Strategy I.8 Book Structure 1. Industrialization and Environmental Regulation in Mexico 1.1 Industrialization Strategies in Mexico 1.2 Environmental Regulation in Mexico 1.3 A Crisis of Contamination 1.4 The Ocotlán–El Salto Industrial Corridor 2. Chronicle of a Struggle: The Negation and the Terror 2.1 The Negation Begins 2.2 A Tragedy That Sparks Protest 2.3 Early Studies of Industrial Effluents 2.4 The Megamarch and Other Protest Actions 2.5 River Reclassification and Treatment Plants 2.6 From the Macrorecommendation to the REF 2.7 Toxic Rivers and Environmental Devastation 3. (Un)regulated Environments and the Santiago River 3.1 The Logics of Environmental Regulation in Mexico 3.2 Environmental Enforcement: Negligence or Omission? 3.3 Self-Reporting: Fiction or Faithful Measure? 3.4 Clean Industry and Self-Regulation 3.5 State- and Municipal-Level Regulation 4. The Enemy at Home: Regulatory Capture and Wastewater Discharge 4.1 Flows of Power 4.2 The Process of Modifying the NOM-001 Standard 4.3 Regulations via Negotiation and Consensus 4.4 Costs and Benefits: The Logic of COFEMER 4.5 Consolidating the Modification of the NOM-001 Standard 5. Corporate Sustainability: Myths and Realities 5.1 Between Sustainability and Greenwashing 5.2 A Myth of the Multinational 5.3 Government through the Eyes of Industry 6. Conclusions: The Road Ahead 6.1 The Contradictions in “Reviving” the Santiago River 6.2 Institutionalized Corruption 6.3 The Myth of the Multinational 6.4 From Sewer of Progress to River of Life Appendix: Methodological Strategy A.1 Institutional Ethnography A.2 Brief Sketch of Research Undertaken A.3 Actor-Oriented Political Ecology A.4 Research Techniques Notes Introduction Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 References Index
