GEO 103 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Environmental Degradation, Dust Bowl
9 Apr 2018
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Document Summary
Dispossessing people of the land they used in common. Private interests appropriate natural resources used collectively by people. Frontiers of settlement where lands are held in common by different people, is appropriated and put into the hands of private interest. This is often accompanied by fierce resistance. Land, water, etc. , is turned into a commodity. Commodity: an item that is primarily valued for its monetary or marketable value (exchange value) Often produced/grown/raised particularly for this purpose (raising chickens to eat) How is capitalism a problem for the environment: Externalizing costs (the products that the solvite process created would be more expensive had they disposed of it in the proper ways, but instead the chemicals were dumped in onondaga lake, which externalized the costs) Minimize regulation, put pressure on government to do this. Capitalism favors present over the future, private over the public. Innovating production to squeeze more surplus from labor.
