Table Of ContentClimate Change from a Criminological Perspective
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Rob White
Editor
Climate Change from
a Criminological Perspective
Editor
Rob White
School of Sociology and Social Work
University of Tasmania
Tasmania, Australia
ISBN 978-1-4614-3639-3 ISBN 978-1-4614-3640-9 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4614-3640-9
Springer New York Heidelberg Dordrecht London
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Contents
1 The Criminology of Climate Change .................................................... 1
Rob White
2 It’s the End of the World as We Know It: The Advance
of Climate Change from a Criminological Perspective ....................... 13
Robert Agnew
3 Heading Toward a New Criminogenic Climate:
Climate Change, Political Economy
and Environmental Security .................................................................. 27
Pete Fussey and Nigel South
4 The Cultural Silence of Climate Change Contrarianism .................... 41
Avi Brisman
5 Is Global Warming a State-Corporate Crime? .................................... 71
Ronald C. Kramer and Raymond J. Michalowski
6 Climate Change in the Courts: A US and Global Perspective ............ 89
Andrew Franz
7 Environmental Enforcement Networks: Their Role
in Climate Change Enforcement ........................................................... 109
Grant Pink and James Lehane
8 Oil Production, Climate Change and Species Decline:
The Case of Norway ................................................................................ 135
Ragnhild Sollund
9 Climate Change, Gender and Natural Disasters:
Social Differences and Environment-Related Victimisation ............... 149
Diane Heckenberg and Ingrid Johnston
v
vi Contents
10 Natural Disasters and Crime: Criminological Lessons
from Hurricane Katrina ......................................................................... 173
Caroline C. Nobo and Rebecca D. Pfeffer
11 Uncontrollable Nuclear Power Accidents and Fatal
Environmental Harm: Why We Have Not Been Ready
for the Impacts of Climate Change ....................................................... 185
Noriyoshi Takemura
12 A Proposal for a New Vehicle-Based Carbon Tax (V-CART):
Vehicle-Based Global Warming Policy and Green Criminology ........ 205
Michael J. Lynch and Paul Stretesky
Index ................................................................................................................. 227
Contributors
Robert Agnew Department of Sociology , Emory University , Atlanta , GA , USA
Avi Brisman Department of Criminal Justice , Eastern Kentucky University ,
Richmond , KY , USA
Andrew Franz Department of Criminology, University of South Florida , Tampa ,
FL, USA
Pete Fussey Department of Sociology , University of Essex , Colchester , UK
Diane Heckenberg School of Sociology and Social Work , University of Tasmania ,
Hobart , TAS , Australia
Ingrid Johnston School of Sociology and Social Work , U niversity of Tasmania ,
Hobart, TAS, Australia
Ronald C. Kramer Department of Sociology , Western Michigan University ,
Kalamazoo , MI , USA
James Lehane Holt , ACT , Australia
Michael J. Lynch Department of Criminology , University of South Florida ,
Tampa , FL , USA
Raymond J. Michalowski Department of Criminal Justice , Northern Arizona
University , Flagstaff , AZ , USA
Caroline C. Nobo Charlestown , MA , USA
Rebecca D. Pfeffer Boston , MA , USA
Grant Pink Latham , ACT , Australia
Ragnhild Sollund Department of Criminology and Sociology of Law ,
University of Oslo , Oslo , Norway
vii
viii Contributors
Nigel South Department of Sociology , University of Essex , Colchester , UK
Paul Stretesky School of Public Affairs , University of Colorado - Denver , Denver ,
CO , USA
Noriyoshi Takemura Department of Law , Toin University of Yokohama ,
Yokohama , Kanagawa , Japan
Rob White School of Sociology and Social Work , University of Tasmania , Hobart ,
Tasmania, Australia
Chapter 1
The Criminology of Climate Change
Rob White
Introduction
Life on planet earth is rapidly being transformed in ways that are profound and for
many of us unimaginable. This is because of global warming that is causing massive
shifts in climate worldwide. Until very recently (see White 2009 ; Stretesky and
Lynch 2 009 ; Lynch and Stretesky 2 010 ) , few criminologists have participated in
analysis of climate change, criminology and criminal justice. This is starting to
change and undoubtedly more criminological research and scholarship will be
undertaken in this area in the coming years.
As a contribution to needed work in this area, this book stands as the fi rst of its
kind to explicitly and speci fi cally deal with climate change from a criminological
perspective. Each chapter deals with a substantive issue relating to crime and climate
change, and together they forge a disturbing picture of what is happening and what
will happen as a consequence of the huge climate-related changes now apparent
around the globe. Before outlining the speci fi c contribution of the various chapters, a
few preliminary comments help to frame the issues in general posed by climate change
and the dilemmas that many of us will face sooner than later in the next few years.
The Slow Crisis of Climate Change
The most pressing issue facing the world today is indeed that of climate change.
It is a problem that is global in nature, yet its impacts will be felt at the local and
regional levels. Climate change is affecting everyone on the planet, even though
R. White (*)
School of Sociology and Social Work , University of Tasmania ,
Private Bag 17 , Hobart , Tasmania 7001 , Australia
e-mail: [email protected]
R. White (ed.), Climate Change from a Criminological Perspective, 1
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4614-3640-9_1, © Springer Science+Business Media New York 2012
2 R. White
certain population groups are more adversely affected than others (White 2 011 ) .
The divides between North and South, geographically and metaphorically, are
already deepening as crises related to food production and distribution, energy
sources and pollution, and changing climates reorder the Old World order. Social
inequality and environmental injustice will undoubtedly be the drivers of continu-
ous con fl ict for many years to come, as the most dispossessed and marginalized
of the world’s population suffer the brunt of food shortages, undrinkable water,
climate-induced migration and general hardship in their day-to-day lives. Women
will suffer more than men, people of colour more than the non-indigenous and
the non-migrant, the young and the elderly more than the adult, and the in fi rm and
disabled of all ages.
I n many ways, and from the vantage point of future generations, present action
and lack of action around climate change will most likely constitute the gravest of
transnational environmental crimes. These harms grow more evident every day, yet
the main protagonists continue to support policies and practices that contribute to
the overall problem (Bulkeley and Newell 2 010 ) . Even with foreknowledge and
scienti fi c proof in hand, powerful interests continue to dominate the climate change
agenda to the advantage of their own sectional interests (see Chap. 4 ), and it is the
poorest of the poor who currently experience the harbingers of things to come for
the rest of us (Shiva 2008 ) . Failure to act, now, is criminal. Yet, things continue
much as they have, the status quo is maintained, and the harms mount up.
Global warming describes the rising of the earth’s temperature over a relatively
short time span. C limate change describes the interrelated effects of this rise in
temperature: from changing sea levels and changing ocean currents, through to the
impacts of temperature change on local environments that affect the endemic fl ora
and fauna in varying ways (for instance, the death of coral due to temperature rises
in sea water or the changed migration patterns of birds). W eather is the name we
give to the direct local experience of things such as sunshine, wind, rain, snow and
the general disposition of the elements. It is about the short-term and personal, not
the long-term patterns associated with climate in general. As the planet warms
up, the climate will change in ways that disrupt previous weather patterns, and will
in some places even bring colder weather, although overall temperatures are on the
rise (Lever-Tracy 2 011 ) .
The urgency and reality of climate change issues was eloquently conveyed in a
May 2010 letter signed by 284 members of the US National Academy of Sciences
published in Science claiming that:
There is compelling, comprehensive and consistent objective evidence that humans are
changing the climate in ways that threaten our societies and the ecosystems on which
we depend. Many recent assaults on climate science and, more disturbingly, on climate
scientists by climate change deniers are typically driven by special interests or dogma, not
by an honest effort to provide an alternative theory that credibly satis fi es the evidence …
(quoted in Lever-Tracy 2 011 , pp. 10–11).
If anything, most disagreement surrounding climate change today is over how
quickly global warming is proceeding rather than over whether it is happening. The
majority of governments now acknowledge that climate change must in some way
