Monthly Archives: October 2011

Things I like

Can rejecting mainstream western values make you happier?

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One of the happiest people I ever met, during a 6 month stay in a Buddhist centre, was a monk named Rabden – curious, I thought, how a man who had rejected just so much of what we regard as normal in Britain, could be so happy. He had no full time job to give him status, he owned no possessions, he obviously had no wife, no friends in the Bessie sense of the word, he never watched TV or listened to music, the only clothes he wore were orange and yellow robes, and he lead a very constrained life of giving classes on Buddhism and meditating. I mean, for Buddha’s sake, he didn’t even have a Facebook account. How on earth could this person be so happy?

Now I know that not that all Buddhist monks are happy, and that not that not all people who are not Buddhist monks are unhappy, but when you meet someone as happy as this individual, it inspires you to know what they know, in this meeting inspired me to learn more about Buddhism and its approach to happiness – 20 years on I think I’m ready to pass this understanding on – but I’m going to break with Buddhist tradition (i.e. I’m going to intellectualize about this rather than live it) and try and demonstrate how the Buddhist path to happiness is the antithesis of how most of us seek to be happy in Western society.

I think this is pretty useful, and fits in nicely with  a few recent sociological/ psychological books on happiness and why so few people are actually happy in western societies. Books such Oliver Jame’s ‘Britain on the Couch’, Michael Foley’s ‘The Age of Absurdity’, and Richard Layard’s Happiness are the kind of books that spring to mind – but this offering is less social-scientific and more personal and spiritual (pseudo-spiritual is probably a better label).

What is happiness and how do we realize it – According to (my interpretation of) Buddhism?

First of all – the way Happiness is conceived of in Buddhism is different to the way it is conceived of in Mainstream Western Society

Achieving happiness for most people in the United Kingdom hinges on accumulating objects, people or states of mind that are believed to be desirable and avoiding objects, people and states of mind that are believed to be undesirable.

The ‘logic of happiness’ is as follows: ‘If I am currently in a state that I want to be in, then I am happy; or, ‘if I am in an undesirable state (for example, at work for many of us) then if I can only get to where I want to be at some future point, then I will be happy in the future.

To give some typical, concrete examples of how most of us think about happiness, it is quite common for many of us to equate happiness with desirable states such as being on holiday, while out shopping for nice new, desirable things; when we are with people we like. Similarly, when we are in undesirable states, we often find ourselves thinking about some happier time in the future: ‘If I can just get that car; have that hairdo; afford that holiday; get drunk at the weekend then I will be happy. Such thoughts are very typical in contemporary Britain, and hardly anyone would take umbrage with anyone else expressing such thoughts.

The above logic of happiness is based around the individual making effort to accumulate things that he or she does not have in this moment. Happiness involves being in a state that one believes to be desirable.

Happiness in Buddhism, on the other hand, is more about being content or satisfied, or sometimes just enduring what is in this present moment, rather than striving to achieve happiness at some future point.

The logic of happiness is ‘I am in this state; I accept it and I will be fully aware in it and focus on it, whether or not I deem this present state to be desirable or undesirable’. The logic is one of fully focusing on the present, on whatever is occurring, on whatever arises, even if that is not pleasant, rather than focusing on states believed to present that one believes one will be in some future time.

To give a concrete example of this, rather than finding myself unhappy at work and distracting myself from work with constant thoughts about what I will be having for dinner later, or about what I will be doing at the weekend, the Buddhist way is to give up on those thoughts of future pleasure and focus on what one is doing right now, in other words, one gives oneself up to the moment whether pleasurable or undesirable rather than giving up on the undesirable moment and distracting oneself with future thoughts of pleasure.

The logic of happiness in Buddhism is one of making an effort to focus on the present, making an effort to control one’s thoughts and desires so they do not take me away from this moment right here and right now. Happiness, or more accurately contentment involves giving up ones desires and accepting what is.

So the Buddhist ideal is one of achieving happiness through giving up desire, rather than trying to gain those things that one desires. This is a logic of happiness to be realised through detachment, rather than happiness to be gained through attachment.

The feeling of this type of happiness is one of peace of mind, of contentment and satisfaction with what one has rather than one of an excited lusting after what one desires, a calm contentment with what is, rather than a seeking after the high of attainment of what one desires.

The implication is that the feeling of happiness in Buddhism is one that is much is calmer than the typical visions of happiness that we have in the West, which often tends to involve images of ‘peak experiences’, of winning a contest, of gaining something extraordinary, of buzzing on a high.

The Buddhist Path to Happiness

The key to happiness in Buddhism is to follow something called the noble eightfold path – and this essentially boils down to the following principles – this isn’t a full interpretation of what’s involved in following Buddhism but these are some of its core principles – (the tenets as named in the path are in brackets)

  1. Knowing yourself and your ‘true nature’ ‘(right understanding’)
  2. Developing compassion (‘right thought’)
  3. Residing in the truth (‘right speech’)
  4. Renouncing material goods (‘right action’ – NB there is a lot more to this, but this is key!)
  5. Doing worthwhile and ethical work (‘right livelihood’)
  6. Leading a disciplined, routine life (‘right effort’)
  7. Being aware of what you are doing and not being carried away by passionate emotions (‘right concentration’)
  8. Meditating (‘right meditation’)

It’s worth noting that these tenets (which aren’t that dissimilar to most other mainstream religious ethical codes) argue that self-constraint and thinking of the social consequences of one’s actions are as important as ‘taking care’ of your ‘self’.

It is further worth noting that all of this links into a certain view of the nature of self and reality – there is logic behind what we should do to be happy and what the nature of the self really is – but I’m not going into that here (it’ll take too long)

The Buddhist view of happiness compared to the Western view of happiness

It is striking how the means whereby so many of us are encouraged to achieve happiness in the West is so often the complete antithesis of how to achieve happiness (defined more accurately as peace of mind) in Buddhism – to contrast to the 8 fold path above – it is not unusual to see people suggesting that one does any number of the following to be happy –

 

  1. Constructing and expressing your self – i.e. your self-identity – through consuming products, constructing a narrative of the self on Facebook, and our obsession with biography and celebrity all suggests we see this as crucial to happiness
  2. Putting yourself, or at least your family first and acting out of self-interest – rather than devoting yourself to the service of others (ok so a lot of people give to charity, but this is after one’s sorted oneself out)
  3. Acting/ concealing aspects of the truth or just downright lying  – ok I’ll admit that lying is generally frowned upon, but our obsession with privacy maybe suggests we like to conceal the fullness of ourselves from the world – and isn’t acting out social roles really just lying about who we really rather than being fully open and honest?
  4. Accumulating stuff and attaching yourself to particular people and values – this is obvious – and it includes our obsession with romantic love and children.
  5. Doing a job primarily for the money rather than the social good – ok once again there are plenty of people who choose to do socially useful jobs, but many who see work as just a means to an end.  
  6. Being free to pick and choose, being freedom from routine, trying new things, striving to constantly reinvent yourself – this speaks for itself
  7. When at work – switching off – again – this should ring true with many
  8. Always doing rather than sitting still – one of my pet hates – we tend to think the happiest people are the busiest – not necessarily true.

So that’s the rather eclectic theory out of the way but the question I’m left with is this – and talk about a question that’s going to be a total nightmare to control for and operationalise – are people who are more inclined to define happiness as ‘peace of mind’ and seek happiness through Buddhist means happier than those who define happiness as ‘maximizing peak experiences’ and who seek happiness through the means of mainstream Western Society?

Related links

The Buddhist way to happiness

Buddha – Pursuit of Happiness

The sources of happiness according to Buddhism

Can Buddhists transcend mental reservations?

Alternatives, Things I like

I hold Jamie Oliver responsible for my present anomic condition

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Reserach suggests Jamie Oliver is responsible for 27% of anomic feelings experienced by UK males aged between 30-39

He’s such an inspiration that, in my efforts to emulate his energetic,  socially-conscious uber-interesting, jam-packed, metro-sexual-male-having-it-all life-style, I simply don’t have time to make his delicious home made-pasta recipe this week – I mean, I’m sure you can feel my pain, I’m gonna have to sink to the lows of bying pasta-in-a-packet.

Fortunately this month’s ethical consumer magazine has a handy guide to packet-pasta and sauce, that allows me to purchase pasta according to my ethical standards – i.e. to avoid purchasing from companies that damage the environment, harm animals, or employ their workers under poor conditions. Actually, perhaps this is another reason why Oliver is responsible for my Anomie – he did such a great job setting up his 15 restaurant, giving local unemployed teens a chance, and then he goes and becomes the face of Sainsbury, which, like the other three supermarkets, are intent on maxmising profit, often at the expense of people and planet.

 

Anyway, back to the pasta –

If you care about animals, you might like to boycott the Bertolli range

The two with the lowest scores include Buitoni (Pasta and Sauce) – owned by Nestle, Bertolli (sauce) – owned by Unilever, and Seeds of Change – owned by Mars (I was expecting Monsanto with a name like that) – this last one’s particularly deceptive as it look so lovely and cosy-homely-organic.

For details of why you might want to avoid the above pasta varieties – follow these links

Boycott Mars – it’s basically over animal testing

Uniliver – is buying palm oil from companies who destroy the rainforest

And Nestle – it’s still babymilk!

The best buys – Clearspring Pasta and La Terra e il Cielo  

Things I like

Fair Trade Versus ‘free trade’

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Fair Trade has expanded massively in the last decade – Here’s a few reasons why I like Fair Trade and why I don’t like the neoliberalised free market. I should have posted this for #worldfoodday – better late than never. Obviously relevant to Global Development course – a post on the limitations of fair trade is coming later

 

Fair Trade – Core principles and practices

‘Fair Trade involves thinking about the practicalities of trade and asking questions such as ‘can trade be made to work for rather than against commodity producers in the South, can the process of production be democratized, ownership shared, organized labour encouraged, child labour unnecessary, environmental sustainability and human rights promoted. Can consumers be induced to think and pay more than they currently think is necessary? Is it possible to survive and even thrive in and against the conventional market place? Is there any bottom line other than price and profit?’[iii]

‘Fair trade is an alternative approach to conventional trade and is based on a partnership between producers and consumers. Fair trade offers producers a better deal and improved terms of trade. This allows them the opportunity to improve their lives and plan for their future. Fair trade offers consumers a powerful way to reduce poverty through their every day shopping.’[iv]

 

What is ‘Fair Trade’?

 A useful and accessible starting point is to turn to in the New Internationalist’s ‘no-nonsense guide to fair trade, in which the author argues that ‘Fair trade addresses the injustices of conventional trade, which traditionally discriminates against the poorest, weakest producers. It enables them to improve their position and have more control over their lives.’ In concrete terms, Ransom distinguishes 7 ideals (see below) that businesses involved in the fair trade movement should be committed to. Despite recent concerns that Fair trade is not as ‘fair’ as it might be in practices, these 7 ideas are still firmly embedded in Fair trade International’s standards for producers and buyers  and include the following

1.         Democratic organization

2.         Recognized Trade unions

3.         Decent working conditions

4.         Environmental sustainability

5.         The minimum price guarantee

6.         The social premium

7.         Long-Term relationships 

Given that one of the core principles of the fair trade movement is ‘democratic organisation’ it is both inevitable and healthy that there is ongoing debate over how these ideals manifest themselves in practice, a factor, along with the global scope and rapid expansion of the movement, which helps to explain why there is such a wide variety of fair trade labeling initiatives.  This said, it is at least possible to discern a shared set of core ideals that, in principle at least, set fair trade apart from ‘free trade’

The democratic imperative in fair trade suggests that to be truly fair, food production and distribution would involve the creation of new food networks, smaller scale, and less oligopolistic than they are today, and the idea of fair shares suggests ethics comes before profits – challenging the very motive for engaging in production and exchange – (on both the part of producers and buyers… ). This potentially puts the practise of fair-trade into conflict with the present global neo-liberal free market system.  This idea is not lost on many in the fair-trade movement

Piercy, commenting on the early origins of the fair trade movement in the 1960s in the United Kingdom, makes the following, more concrete criticisms of ‘free market’ economics.[v]

  • The poorer countries becoming caught in a trap of producing raw materials that are subject to price fluctuations while wealthier countries ‘added’ value to these raw materials by producing them
  • The increasing subsidies wielded by MNCs – receiving subsidies from governments in the form of tax breaks or infrastructural development.
  • Quotas on imports to protect key industries.
  • Subsidies to farmers in developing countries, meaning the prices of their products are cheaper than those produced by farmers in the developing world.
  • MNCs using their buying power to force down prices paid to farmers in the developing world down, resulting in prices in supermarkets going down.
  • The agents of large companies often bribed officials to encourage them to ignore health and safety and labour laws, allowing the all too familiar and terrible sweatshop conditions

Similarly, even the briefest perusal of some of the informative material produced by the World Development Movement[vi] or even a more mainstream group such as Oxfam[vii], both founder members of Fair trade International, reveals many criticisms of the way that various and numerous multinationals, the World Trade organization and The European Union operate in ways that systematically put profits for shareholders over people and planet.

 

The fair trade standards – the institutional framework

Before examining the extent to which the ‘Supermarkets’ move into the fair trade market transgresses the spirit and practice of fair trade, it is necessary to outline in concrete terms what exactly the ideals mean in practice, to this we need to look at the institutional framework which informs fair trade standards.

Fair trade International is the international body with overall responsibility for developing the fair trade standards associated with the fair trade logo and brings together production, purchasing and consumption through devising and maintaining the standards which producers and buyers agree to in order to qualify for certification and be able to display the fair trade logo[1]. The standards are different for producers and buyers, and much more rigorous for producers.

Producers must be democratically organized, preferably into co-operatives or other democratic associations, the right of workers to join trades unions and enjoy decent working conditions will be guaranteed, and there will be no child labour. There will also be a commitment to reinvesting profits into the social development of the workers and wider community and any productive enterprise should be environmentally sustainable.

Buyers that purchase fair trade products guarantee to pay a ‘premium price’ that covers the cost of production – and is enough for investment in longer term social development. Buyers also have to commit to long term relationships with their producers.

 

The Fair Trade Standards

Fair trade International publishes several documents that outline the standards fair-trade producers and buyers need to maintain in order to qualify for fair-trade status and be able to display the fair-trade local. There are separate, yet overlapping standards, based on core principles for producers and buyers of fair-trade products

  • For producers  standards are outlined separately for small scale producers[2]; contract production[3] and for hired labour[4]
  • Standards for buyers are outlined in the ‘The Generic Fair trade trade standards’[5] document which outline the relationship between producers and buyers. In addition there are also additional, specific standards for producers producing certain products[6] and a prohibited materials list[7],

 

The seven ideals of fair trade – what they mean in practice

Below is an outline of what Ransom’s seven ideals of fair trade should look like in practice, if we take the standards outlined by Fair trade international as a base.

 

1. Democratic organization –

It is believed that the best way of guaranteeing that trade adds to the social and economic development of producers and of their communities is to ensure as far as possible that producers are be small scale, preferably organized along co-operative lines so that they are democratically controlled by their members. All members should have a voice and vote in the decision-making process of the organization and there should be no discrimination on the basis of any “distinction of any kind such as, race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status”

Probably less well known is that fair-trade producers should aim to establish more control over the productive processes related to their own production through, for example, establishing more direct communication and negotiation with buyers, adding value by establishing processing facilities and/ or by heading towards mutual ownership with other producer organizations

2. Recognized Trade unions– Where not co-operatively owned, as is the case in many large scale fair-trade producers, workers will have the right to join an independent union and to organize collectively to improve their bargaining power in relation to their employers. This obviously implies that workers will be contractually employed and that the company will have overt, written employment policies, clearly outlining the conditions of employment.

3. Decent working conditions – workers should receive at least a living wage, not be required to do forced overtime, have decent breaks and work within god health and safety parameters. The organization is also expected to will continue to develop its business-related operations and maximise the return to the members, which may involve reducing cost in operations, increasingly skilled management and staff, the building up of working capital, implementation of quality control, training/education and risk management. Working conditions should be equitable for all workers. Salaries must be equal or higher than the regional average or than the minimum wage in effect. Health and safety measures must be established in order to avoid work-related injuries. A crucial part of this ideal is that child labour does not occur. Fair Trade licensing requires that children below the age of 15 are not employed. According to the standards laid down by the fair trade foundation, child Labour is not altogether banned as children may help their parents after school and during holidays, but only on the conditions that working hours do not ‘jeapordise’ the child’s education, through preventing the child attending school for example, and that work is supervised by a parent and that the child’s wellbeing is not undermined in any way.

4. Environmental sustainability – Producer organizations are expected to assess the environmental impacts of its members’ operations, to develop plans designed to mitigate those impacts and to monitor the implementation of those plans – the standards outline a fairly lengthy list of expectations – such as protecting virgin forest, establishing buffer zones, not depleting local resources and improving members standard of living so they can live more sustainably. Given that by far the largest fair trade sector is in agriculture, it is no great surprise to find that the conservation of soil is a primary tenet of sustainable agricultural production. Finally, to get fair trade accredited, certain things are band such as Genetically Modified Organisms.

5. The minimum price guarantee – fair trade buyers agree to pay a minimum price for products even when the market price for that product falls below the minimum price. This is to provide a degree of security of income, guarding against increasingly volatile price fluctuations in the price of food. The minimum price varies by product. Companies trading Fair trade products must pay a price to producers that aims to cover the costs of sustainable production: the fair trade minimum price, and also pay an additional sum that producers can invest in development: the fair trade premium.

6. The social premium – The ‘minimum standards’ are fairly straightforward – the fair trade premium must be democratically spent in accordance with Fair trade Standards to improve the social wellbeing of the workers in the producer organization, their families, and the wider community. What the money gets spent on will depend on the perceived needs and wants of the particular community of producers. Examples of how the premium has been spent include everything from work relating training for employees, to buying text books for worker’s children, to improving local buildings and water supplies. Money has even been spent on developing a local football club in one South African community. See the section on ‘case studies’ for more details.

7.Long-Term relationships – Producers are expected to partially pay for products in advance when producers ask for it and to sign contracts that allow for long-term planning and sustainable production practices.

 

Fair Trade against Free trade

I don’t want to go into detail about the global ‘free trade’ food system – but this is the briefest comparisons of how the mainstream food business undermines the principles of fair trade.

Selected principles of the Fair Trade Movement Selected principles of the neo-liberal free market system
 

  • Democratic organization – ideally in the form of co-operative organization where workers own and control the company for which they work.
  • Recognized Trade unions –workers will have the right to organize collectively to improve their bargaining power in relation to their employers.
  • Decent working conditions – workers should receive at least a living wage, not be required to do forced overtime, have decent breaks and work within god health and safety parameters
  • Environmental sustainability – small scale production
  • The minimum price guarantee – fair trade buyers agree to pay a minimum price for products even when the market price for that product falls below the minimum price. This is to provide a degree of security of income, guarding against increasingly volatile price fluctuations in the price of food. The minimum price varies by product.
  • The social premium
  • Long-Term relationships
  

  • Top down management style – CEOs and directors run the company of behalf of distant shareholders – CEOs and directors control shares themselves – strategic decisions made by senior managers with little input from workers / Distancing of those  in the supply ‘Outsourcing’ production -lengthy and obscure supply chains / rule of the consumer rather than the producer
  • Increasing trend towards hiring of agency workers who have fewer rights. Some companies do not allow workers or actively discourage workers to join trades unions
  • Sweat shop labour, moving around ‘race to the bottom’
  • Industrialized mass production techniques, widespread pollution..
  • Using monopoly power to push prices paid for raw materials down/ gambling on food prices and increasing sustainability/ Subsidies to EU farmers – undermines principle of a ‘fair market price’ WTO, monopoly power…
  • WTO lead Neoliberalisation – undermining the welfare state – through encouraging privatization and deregulation
  • Failure to engage in enduring relationships

 

Sources 

[1] Certification is carried out by a separate body – see flo and NET for more details.

[2] http://www.fair trade.net/fileadmin/user_upload/content/2009/standards/documents/04 10_EN_Generic_Fair trade_Standards_SPO_Aug_09_EN_amended_version_04-10.pdf

[4] http://www.fair trade.net/fileadmin/user_upload/content/2009/standards/documents/04 10_EN_Generic_Fair trade_Standard_HL_Aug_2009_EN_amended_version_04-10.pdf

[6] http://www.fair trade.net/product-standards.0.html

[7] http://www.fair trade.net/fileadmin/user_upload/content/FLO_Prohibited_Materials_List_Dec_2007_EN.pdf


[i] http://fair tradecertified.org/get-involved/blog/producer-voices-kuapa-kokoo-ghana

[ii] http://journeyforfair trade.blogspot.com/2011/03/listening-to-voices-indonesia.html

[iii] Ransom, David (2007) The No-Nonsense Guide to Fair Trade, New Internationalist

[iv] Fair Trade International – http://www.fair trade.org.uk/what_is_fair trade/faqs.aspx

[v] Piercy (2009) Jeremy: Coffins, Cats and Fair Trade Sex Toys, Quick Brown Fox Publications

[vi] http://www.wdm.org.uk/blog/fair-trade-not-just-fair trade

[vii] http://www.oxfam.org.uk/resources/issues/trade/introduction.html

 

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Transnational Coffee Corporations cost me 6 months of my life

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6 months – that’s how long I will have to work to pay for the mark up on the coffee I consume in coffee-houses over the next 30 years if I carry on consuming at my present rate. I know this as I’ve started a reflexive project in which I chart exactly what I spend money on – the purpose being to try and spend less – I’ve got a long way to go…

£56.85 – That’s the total amount of money I spent on take-out and drink-in coffee and munchies (mainly muffins) in September.

If I take this as an average monthly expenditure, although I think it’s slightly slack compared to normal, this means I spend £682 a month on take-out coffee

I picked up this habit when I started in my current job about 10 years ago, and I think I’m week enough to carry it on for another 30 years, by which time I’ll be 68, which by thankful coincidence  is also the age at which I am due to retire (yes, it scares me too), which means that over a 40 year period I would have spent a total of £27 280 on take-out and drink-in coffee over the course of my working life.

Given that I’m pretty much at the top of my pay scale, after income tax, NI and pensions contributions, this is pretty much bang on my average yearly take home pay over my working life.

This means that I will spend one year of my working life simply to pay for the coffees and munchies I buy in overpriced coffee houses –

Given that this is a slack month of coffee drinking for me (i.e. I’d normally drink more) and the likelihood of the cost of coffee going up relative to my income in coming years, the figures are probably even more disheartening that that.

Clearly I’m not the only one overindulging in caffeine –  

Costa Coffee consumption

2009/10 was an outstanding year for Costa. – profit grew by 59.5% to £36.2 million; with 312 net new stores were acquired or opened;

Cafe Nero’s profit for last year was approximately £17.34 million – from a revenue of 43.4 million – this later comparison gives me an idea of the extent to which I’m basically being ripped off – nearly half of what I pay for a take out coffee assuming that the ratios are similar for all chains, goes straight into the profits of these Corporations.

Oh, for ethical reasons, I don’t do Starbucks – although no doubt Nero’s and Costa are just as bad ethically!

But OMG – If I keep this up, that’s 6 months of my life that I work to feed the profit margins of Coffee Corporations

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Sex selective abortion and generation xy

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A few updates on sex selection – this is pretty strong evidence of how technology is being used to reinforce patriarchal systems in the developing world… Also a good example of how aid can have gendered consequences… read on!

In ‘Unnatural Selection’ by Mara Hvistendahl charts how the trend towards choosing boys over girls, largely through sex-selective abortions, is rapidly spreading across the developing world. Things are serious –

  • The natural sex ratio at birth is 105 boys born for every 100 girls
  • In India the sex ratio is 112 boys to 100 girls
  • In China the ratio is 121 to 100.
  • In places in China where 2 children are allowed, if the first child is a girl, the sex ratio of the second is 146 -100.

The bias towards boys has been estimated to have caused the “disappearance” of 160 million women and girls in Asia alone over the past few decades.

The unnatural skewing towards male populations has become so pronounced in recent decades that Hvistendahl, a writer for Science magazine, says it has given rise to a new “Generation XY”.

What’s the cause of sex selection?

Female infanticide has traditionally been common in India and China – with one study of Tamil Nadu in the mid 90s finding that approximately one fifth of families had admitted to ‘doing away’ with an unwanted female baby. More recently, new technologies have allowed for sex selective abortion – and again, just to take one study as an example, out of 8000 abortions, 7999 were female (see link below for stats)

It’s usual to blame cultural practices – a cultural preference for boys in traditionally patriarchal societies:

he bias against females in India is related to the fact that “Sons are called upon to provide the income; they are the ones who do most of the work in the fields. In this way sons are looked to as a type of insurance. With this perspective, it becomes clearer that the high value given to males decreases the value given to females.” The problem is also intimately tied to the institution of dowry in which the family of a prospective bride must pay enormous sums of money to the family in which the woman will live after marriage. Though formally outlawed, the institution is still pervasive.

Hvistendahl, however,  points out that the increase in abortions of female foetuses in Asia has only become possible with the import of new medical technologies – namely ultrasound  – which allows the early detection of a foetus’ sex – and such technologies have been imported by aid agencies such as the UN in order to combat global population growth.

What are the consequences?

It’s difficult to know with any certainty, as these imbalanced Asian sex ratios are only just manifesting themselves – but two possibilities stand out –

Firstly – according to this article –

over the next 20 years in large parts of Asia there will be an excess of males. In parts of China and India, there will be a 12–15% excess of young men. These men will remain single and will be unable to have families.

An additional problem is that many of these men are rural peasants of low socioeconomic class and with limited education . When there is a shortage of women in the marriage market, the women can “marry up,” inevitably leaving the least desirable men with no marriage prospects . So, in many communities today there are growing numbers of young men in the lower echelons of society who are marginalized because of lack of family prospects and who have little outlet for sexual energy. A number of commentators predict that this situation will lead to increased levels of antisocial behavior and violence and will ultimately present a threat to the stability and security of society.

Some commentators even argue that these men may find themselves heading into military organisations – leading to possible global instability.

The second consequence is increase in the trafficking of women – for either forced marriage or sex in prostitution – as those wealthy enough choose to either buy a permanent wife or a number of temporary liaisons. The total number of brides trafficked in Asia is small – around 100, but rising… if the above predictions are correct, we can expect a larger increase in coming years.

 

 

 

Crime Control, Sociology Songs

Sonny’s Lettah – Linton Kwesi Johnson

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Listened to this with my class yesterday – a great way of illustrating the extent of police racism in the 1980s as manifested most obviously under the sus laws – Sonny’s Lettah is taken almost verbatim from a letter written by a black youth (according to this blog) to his mother in Jamaica explaning why he’s in jail – basically he killed a cop in the process of defending his brother from an unprovoked incident of racist police brutality.

 

 

 

I include selected lyrics below, the full lyrics, and translation, can be found here

it was de miggle a di rush hour
hevrybody jus a hustle and a bustle
to go home fi dem evenin shower
mi an Jim stan up waitin pon a bus
not causin no fuss

when all of a sudden a police van pull up
out jump tree policemen
de whole a dem carryin baton
dem walk straight up to me and Jim
one a dem hold on to Jim
seh dem tekin him in
Jim tell him fi leggo a him
for him nah do nutt’n
and ‘im nah t’ief, not even a but’n
Jim start to wriggle
de police start to giggle

mama, mek I tell you wa dem do to Jim?
mek I tell you wa dem do to ‘im?

Dem thump him him in him belly and it turn to jelly
Dem lick ‘im pon ‘im back and ‘im rib get pop
Dem thump him pon him head but it tough like lead
Dem kick ‘im in ‘im seed and it started to bleed

The whole album – Forces of Victory – is stacked full of songs relevant to teaching about police racism in the 1980s –

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Sesame street’s Hungry Puppet – It sucks being poor, but here’s how to cope

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Sesame Street recently introduced a new puppet – Lilly, whose family is living on the breadline, like 17 million families in America who face ‘food insecurity’. She was introduced in an hour long special called ‘growing hope against hunger’  in which advice was given about how to cope with poverty.

I know this is suppossed to be raising awareness of a serious issue, but I can’t help but think all this is doing is ‘normalising poverty’ – making people aware that it exists and assisting them with coping strategies – rather than confronting the underlying causes – kind of like the therapeutic turn in wider society – ‘life’s shit but here’s how all you isolated individuals can cope…. BTW tripe tastes great, honest’.

Being based in the UK I didn’t see the show, but I somehow doubt that it featured any consciousness raising of just how many Americans are facing dire poverty – some of whom cannot actually afford to feed themselves even thought they are working – you know, the kind of collective consciousness raising which might start to make people question whether or not there just might be something flawed about the system that creates such poverty…

I also can’t quite imagine that it explored the role of Corporations such as Goldmansachs investing in the commodities futures markets leading to the inflation of food prices.

Nor, I imagine, did it feature Big Bird and friends taking a daytrip to #occupywallstreet to learn about the flaws in the capitalist system that allow the richest one percent to carry on getting richer while 17 million people in Capitalism’s fading heartland go hungry…

Finally, though I’d love to see it, I fear that also missing from the show would have been the old ‘one of these kids is doing his own thing’ skit – which could have featured fat (for dramatic affect) city financiers jetting around the world in one box while another three people suffer unemployment, undernourishment and police harrassment (for those that highlight the injustices in the system that is).

Things may be bad here in Britain, but however bad they get, I always feel relatively better when I reflect on the fact that I’m not American.

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#Worldfoodday – The global extent undernourisment

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In honour of world food day – My next three blogs aim to provide an overview of three core issues related to global hunger and malnutrition.

  1. The global extent of hunger and malnutrition – highlighting the worst affected areas including a couple of case studies
  2. The causes of hunger and malnutrition – while there are many, it’s not that hard to get your head around the causes – what is hard to get your head around is the appalling morality of vested interested responsible for causing global hunger  
  3. Possible solutions to global hunger and malnutrition – a quick look at some very straightforward measures that would help relieve global hunger  

 The blogs are aimed to provide an accessible overview and links to further resources for A level students studying the A2 Global Development module in Sociology. Obviously malnutrition is   

 Key terms

 World Hunger Poverty facts and stats is a good source for key terms-

  • Undernourishment – Those who are Undernourished are those individuals whose food intake falls below the minimum level of dietary energy requirements –approximately 1600 calories a day, although undernourishment can obviously take other forms besides pure calorie undernourishment as people may have sufficient calories but lacking in nutrients such as vitamins and protein. The FAOs’ method of calculating the proportion of the population who are undernourished is complex – but I’m not going into that here!
  • Malnutrition is the broader term that describes the condition that results from taking an unbalanced diet in which certain nutrients are lacking, in excess (too high an intake), or in the wrong proportions. Most of the stats used below refer to undernourishment rather than malnourishment
  • Famine -For the UN to officially declare a famine, three important conditions must be met. First, 20 per cent of the population must have fewer than 2100 kilocalories (NB not calories, the two are different measurements) of food available per day. Secondly, more than 30 per cent of children must be acutely malnourished. And finally, two deaths per day in every 10,000 people – or four deaths per day in every 10,000 children – must be being caused by lack of food.

 

The Global extent of undernourishment

Key resources for this section –

In 1990, the first Millennium Development Goal of tackling poverty and hunger set out the halve the number of people facing hunger by 2015 – the MDG website notes that progress towards this goal has recently stalled

If we look at percentages, then some progress has been made – In 1990, 20% of the world’s population was undernourished, and this had decreased to 16 per cent by 2005-2007, the latest period for which hard data is available. While this is progress, this is nowhere near on target to halve the proportion of people suffering hunger – in fact progress had started to stall as early as s 2000-2002 – and there is now, realistically, no chance of the 2015 goal being achieved (well unless the starving die in sufficient numbers!)

If, however, we look at gross numbers then the total number of undernourished people has actually increased (the global population has increased overall) In 2005-2007, the last period assessed, 830 million people were still undernourished, which was an increase from 817 million in 1990-1992.

The UN Food and Agricultural Organization estimates the number of malnourished people may have been as high as 1 billion in 2009, following the financial crisis and food price spikes, but the FAO expects that this is the peak year and that numbers should decline into 2010 onwards. The latest 2010 FAO estimates are that 925 million people are malnourished around the globe

Regions –

 

Nearly all of the undernourished people in the world live in developing countries. Going back to the hard data from the UN – Looking at regions – take your pick as to which of the following two scenarios are worst – the highest proportion of malnourished people are in sub Saharan Africa – 26% of the population – but at least this 2008 figure shows a 5% reduction on the 1990 figure of 31%.

In Southern Asia, the percentage is lower – 21%, but this figure is the same as the 1990 figure – meaning there has been no progress on tackling malnourishment is this area in almost two decades. It’s worth noting that in a similar time period, the number of Billionaires in India increased from 0 in 1990 to 55 in 2011

Obviously I could have talked about the East African Famine and the recent Food Riots as indicators of the global food crisis – but that’s as much time as I’ve got – next blog will look at some of the causes of undernourishment

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#WorldRevolution – #Occupywallstreet and #Occupy the city

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Interesting developments in the global occupation movement –

OK so my tiwtter feeds are somewhat biased, but I found these three photos within the last two dozen tweets –

London – (where the police are being shits apparantly)

France

Italy

and you can follow the US #occupy the city on a live stream here!

 

Watch live streaming video from globalrevolution at livestream.com

This is truly innovative activitism and a move forwards from the global anticapitalist movement (at least if that’s what they end up calling themselves!)

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The influence of parents, places and poverty on educational attitudes and aspirations

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This latest Longitudinal Study by the JRF provides evidence of generally high aspirations among young people and challenges assumptions that there is aproblem of low aspirations among young people from more disadvantaged backgrounds.

NB – I just cut and paste selected bits from this while listening to Led Zep IV – personally I think the result is better than the exec. summary by JRF…

The research was conducted in areas of London, Nottingham and Glasgow.490 students aged approximately 13 were interviewed individually in 2007–8; 288 of the same students were interviewed again in 2010 at around age 15. These interviews were supplemented by focus groups with young people and further interviews with parents, teachers and community representatives.

 The Key findings on aspirations include –

  • Firstly, aspirations varied across the three areas – thus debunking the myth that those from deprived areas had universally low aspiration
  • In general, Young people’s ambitions for education and jobs were high. Most hoped to go to university, and aspired to professional and managerial jobs in far greater numbers than the proportions of those posts in the labour market.
  • There was little evidence of fatalism in the face of a depressed labour market, or of a belief that not working was an acceptable outcome.
  • Young people’s aspirations were not predominantly unrealistic. At 13, the ideal occupations of many were drawn from sport or celebrity, but this had waned by age 15. It was not the case that large numbers of young people wanted to become pop stars or Premiership footballers.
  • Parent’s aspirations for their children mattered – there was a correlation between what parents wanted for their children and their children’s’ aspirations.

The study also notes that there were certain barriers to children from deprived areas realising their aspirations – most notably the following two –

  • Firstly, lack of opportunities – there simply are not enough university- professional type jobs to meet the aspirations for those jobs for example
  • Secondly, lack of information about opportunities – both in the sense of exposure to the job market and universities from ages 13-15…

So there you go – my work here for the day is done – yet more evidence selected that fits my worldview – it’s not the fault of the poor, it’s lack of legitimate opportunities – Oh, and is it just me or does everything come back to Merton’s Strain Theory at the end of the day???