The article by Thomas Homer-Dixon discusses how scarcity of renewable resources, in combination with other social factors, can cause violent clashes. Scarcity alone does not cause violence, it requires other factors such as inequality, migration, and the functioning of social institutions. He states that in a society with shortage of renewable resource, the elites within a society keep the bulk of the resources for themselves. The cycle of scarcity and violence lead to further scarcity. He gives many examples of resources that when scarce lead to violence. However, there is not a clear solution provided that would solve this problem. Chapter 17 talks about the issue of the environmental impact that people have on society. The book states
Another problem that we may stumble upon would be relying on other people to be ecologically responsible instead of ourselves. We often believe that there are other people out there in the world who are making a difference and so we passively sit back and do nothing. However, we are all accountable for our own actions. Palmer (2015) is a man who worked around the world with people from every major religion from Daoism to Zoroastrianism. He has witnessed many religious environmental movements emerge and grow. He states that the basis of the environmental
“We have been taught to measure, manage, exploit the environment, to make money off of it on the back ' s of others near and far. We 've been encouraged to ignore it, to stay out of its messy dirty places. To ignore it is to ignore ourselves, our bodies, our forces and our relationships"
From the very start of the play when Juror 10 is first introduced, he has been portrayed as a selfish and impatient person. As a character, he really makes the title of the play stand out as ‘The Twelve Angry Men’, due to his short temper. He usually has negative opinions regarding anyone who is different than he is, hence the strong disagreement with Juror 8 about the boy being guilty or not guilty. The fact that he says, “I’ve lived among ‘em all my life. You can’t believe a word they say.
“All Biofuels Are Not Created Equal” is a very informative article that everyone should be aware of. The authors of this article show how biofuels can be made to benefit Earth. Our ecological footprint is so big that everyone requires 2.5 Earths to maintain the same lifestyle. What does this reveal? It reveals that Earth’s resources are being diminished. This means that the world needs to do something to prevent this so Earth can last for future generations. The way that biofuels are being made is not very effective in helping this problem. This is because it either requires deforestation or the burning of fossil fuels, which the world is trying to stop. Instead of using corn or sugar cane as ethanol, alternative crops should be used
The first challenge in this essay is to shift the way people think about some of the biggest environmental problems that are affecting humanity in a global level, rather to see them as independent and isolated problems to view them as a whole, as a part of a system and as a consequence of other different problems that are being faced in other parts of the world.
Monster and Men have been around for ample number of years. In addition to this, every circumstance they have been portrayed in literature of some sort varies from the author to the time period to the genre. Three indigenous pieces that differ from each other are obscure from the: Macbeth, Beowulf, and Frankenstein. All three writers published each for separate purposes. William Shakespeare Constructed Macbeth for the king and was hinting advice toward the king. In reflection, the epic poem of Beowulf is not similar to Frankenstein in anyway. However all of these pieces of literature have an allusion to monsters and men. In stating this monsters and men are not universal throughout the genres of tragedy, epic poem, and romanticism novel.
Both Bryce and Gore illustrate their ideas of energy independence through economics. In his article, Gore proposes a five step plan, with an objective of being able to produce all of America’s energy from green energy sources within 10 years. His proposal comprises of a large investment that will put people to work. Gore promises his strategy will create millions of jobs, while simultaneously progressing the United States into independence from foreign energy, therefore having a positive impact on the economy. On the other hand, Bryce claims that a majority of Americans are largely ignorant about this energy initiative. Horrified by terrorist attacks such as 9/11, he claims that the average American considers all foreign oil as dangerous. They believe that buying oil from the Middle East is a major source of funding for terrorism. Gore would argue the rise of young Americans and their potential to play a fundamental role in securing the nation’s future with monumental moments such as, landing a man on the moon and Barack Obamas campaign.
Looking back to my first post about “Resources and Scarcity”, I recall choosing an article that talked about the expected water shortage in the Middle East. The article, by John Vidal, stressed the increasing demand of available potable water, and the decreasing supply due to changes in climate such as higher temperatures. In addition, the article also stated the various dangers that were expected due to decreasing supplies. This danger includes thousands of people being forced to relocate, and various complications with economic growth and national security. The article also covered the negative effects that agricultural workers should expect to face. These problems included death of cattle, damage to crops, and loss of jobs. Almost two months
Firstly, the bibliography is not representative of the vast existing literature about conflict, development and violence (Jones and Rodgers 2011).The majority of the literature mentioned is based on quantitative parallels between economic and political aspects and conflict. This goes against the World Bank claims that “Our approach is multidisciplinary and draws on both quantitative and qualitative evidence” (2011, p. 73). The lack of qualitative data is also apparent in the report’s explanation that it structure is adequate with theories of violence in various disciplines with the use of box 3.4 page 104 that is based on the research of economists. Even tough they are prominent scholars in the violence and conflict debate; they are novice in this debate that emerged with classic figures that are not mentioned in the bibliography such as Machiavelli arguing that conflict contributes to the stability of the society (in Jones and Rodgers 2011, p.983). Hobbes is mentioned only once page 75. This is also the case for Tilly (2003) that is considered as one of the most prominent scholars that have studied the relation between violence and the state. The main idea in his work is about what work does violence and conflicts do and make a distinction between many types of violence, what the report does not. Finally, Galtung developed the idea of peacebuilding, insisting on the formation of peacebuilding structure in
on the role of the environment. It is evident that society today deeply values the environment as
Climate change is becoming a focal point for security and conflict research. Research suggests that violent conflict is affected by climate change and this could become increasingly worse in the future. Barnett, J., Adger, W. (2007) suggest that climate change undermines human security by reducing the access to natural resources that sustain people’s way of life. Climate change also has the capacity to undermine states as well by cutting off the states ability to provide opportunities and services that help maintain life and which help to maintain and build peace in daily life. With access to natural resources diminishing and the state not being able to provide opportunities and services that help maintain life and human security this
For example, scarce resources inflicted by either environmental exploitation, environmental privatization, or natural causes, can impoverish nations dependent on these resources—subjecting them to compensate by taking loans in order to afford the maintenance and importing of resources; in almost all cases, loans come attached with compounded interest, which can easily accumulate faster than the nation’s economic growth (Kennedy, 1995; Maltritz, 2010). The pressure placed on a nation unable to pay back its debts accordingly can result in economic depravation and the disruption of key social institutions, which in turn can elicit “deprivation” conflicts such as corruption, civil strife, and insurgency. For the impoverished nation’s citizens, the repercussions constitute rampant civil crime and violence; such was, and is still, the case for Africa and South America (Homer, 1994; Jackson, 1985). Poor populations suffer the most from scarcity induced crime since they are unable to buffer themselves as well as wealthier populations (Homer-Dixon, 1994); this fundamentally places them at a disadvantage, in which individuals inescapably accrue
According to Collier and Hoeffer (2003), there are three major factors that depend on the primary commodity exports such as income per capita, rate of economic growth, and structure of the economy,” the higher the rate of primary commodities exports the higher the level of risk of conflict. Developing countries that are dependent on natural resources are more liable to terms of trade shocks, which lead to instability and dissatisfaction within the groups that suffer the shocks. Since natural resources are wealth and unevenly distributed causes the rebel groups ventures in various forms of extortion, exploitation, and trade of primary commodity. The best-known types of conflict are the diamond of Angola and Sierra Leone and various
An ecosystem is a connection among living resources, residents, and habitats of an area. It includes animals, plants, microorganisms, trees, water and people. Everything that lives in that specific ecosystem is reliant on the other elements of that ecological society. Oceans are considered ecosystems due to the plant life supporting the animal life and also the animal life supporting the plant life. The earth’s marine waters cover two- thirds of its surface making marine ecosystem the largest of its aquatic ecosystems. In this paper we will identify the effects that a growing human population may have on that ecosystem’s resources, including loss or harm to populations of wild species, discuss one
Free markets are defined as “A market (for a particular commodity, etc.) in which prices are not fixed or regulated; (chiefly with the) an economic system in which prices are determined by unrestricted competition between privately owned businesses” (Oxford English Dictionary, 2014). Classical economists believed that free markets; along with limited government, low taxes and protection of property rights were important to create a prosperous economy. Genetski, 2011, names some benefits of an economy making use of the free market system. Although complex, free markets use resources efficiently. The scarcity of a resource is determined by the price in which an individual will have to pay for it. For example, if a good or service is more expensive, then “a high price signals a product or resource that is relatively scarce compared to its demand” (Genetski, 2011, p. 14). The price that an individual is willing to pay for a particular item also signals the choices we make to the producers. This in turn, allows producers to know which products to make or services to offer, how to manufacturer the product and even whether to use foreign or domestic resources. Genetski, (2011), says “in a free market, hard-working conscientious workers that contribute to creating more value tend to get paid more than lazy, less conscientious workers” (p. 15). This will provide an incentive for workers to be more productive. There has been and will always be objections to using a free-market system;