THE BHOPAL DISASTER AND CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
RESOURCE LIST
Provided by Kim Fortun, Associate Professor of Science and Technology Studies, Center for Ethics in Complex System, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. June 15, 2004
Topical sections:
Bhopal
Sustainable Development
Sustainable Development in South Asia
Sustainable Development and Corporate Responsibility
BHOPAL
Films
British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), “Bhopal, The Second Tragedy”
This film is a BBC production from 1994, narrated by correspondent Mark Tully. It provides a brief account of Bhopal in December 1984 but focuses on the ten following years – to account for what is called “the second tragedy.” The “second tragedy” refers to rehabilitation in Bhopal itself, to the litigation of the case in India and the United States, and to multinational corporate conduct around the world. Tully makes a strong argument that gas victims in Bhopal have not received adequate compensation or health care, that Union Carbide has not been held accountable through law and that and that the petrochemical industry is operating dangerously and “above the law” around the world. A great deal of detail is provided to support this argument; the detail effectively conveys the range and complexity of the issues that need to be dealt with in the aftermath of Bhopal, though the detail could be somewhat tedious for younger students. The great strength of this film is its Indian footage, which includes interviews with many gas victims, with Indian legal advocates for gas victims, and with judges in Bhopal’s compensation courts. It also includes interviews with US lawyers and environmental activists, and with Union Carbide officials. The film provokes many questions about what can and should be done in the future – in Bhopal itself, and around the world where the chemical industry operates. While the film has a strong argument and doesn’t show Union Carbide (or other any other corporation) doing much at all that is admirable, it is a very good way to introduce students to the many issues and enduring tragedy of Bhopal.
Appalshop Media and Arts Center, Chemical Valley
This film provides an excellent account of community response to the Bhopal disaster in West Virginia, where the “sister” plant of the Bhopal plant is located. The Institute, West Virginia plant is considered the sister plant of the Bhopal plant because it manufactures the same chemicals and is based on a similar plant design. The film includes footage of community meetings with officials from Union Carbide and lively interviews with various stakeholders, including plant workers, students at a college campus that shares a fence line with the plant, and with African-American residents who live nearby. The film also includes a brief and compelling history of the chemical industry, including a discussion of the promise of chemicals to achieve food self-sufficiency in post-colonial nations.
Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers Union (OCAW), “Out of Control: The Story of Corporate Recklessness in the Chemical Industry”
An OCAW filmfocused on the US petrochemical industry and the spate of “almost Bhopals” in the 1990s – a period characterized by de-unionization, globalization, and rumors that protest against unsafe plants could result in plant closures and their transfer to other countries. The film has incredible footage of plant explosions, which convey the sheer magnitude and force of many chemical facilities. It also has many interviews with plant workers with inside knowledge of how chemical plants work and are maintained, with environmental activists, and with resident of “chemical communities.” It says, “the story started in Bhopal,” when the world came to know how hazardous the chemical industry is – for workers, for people living nearby and for the environment. The story then revolves around efforts to secure the “right-to-know” about chemical risks – through worker and community activism, environmental regulation and congressional hearings. Like Bhopal: The Second Tragedy, this film doesn’t show corporations doing much of anything right. But it is very well done, and the footage is forceful enough to engage most viewers and spur productive discussion.
Articles
Meera Nanda, “Waiting for Justice: Union Carbide’s Legacy in Bhopal” ’
Written six years after the gas leak in Bhopal, this article explains and critiques the litigation and out-of-court settlement of the Bhopal case.
Chandana Mathur and Ward Morehouse, “Twice Poisoned Bhopal: Notes on the Continuing Aftermath of the World’s Worst Industrial Disaster”
This article, published in the journal International Labor and Working-Class History, provides both a basic account of the Bhopal disaster, and an update on continuing issues through 2002.
Greenpeace, “Bhopal Victims Warn U.S Government and Dow Chemical of Impending Catastrophe”
This brief article describes how the threat of terrorism exacerbates the risks of chemical plants, and heightens the possibility of “another Bhopal,” It provides links to a wealth of additional material on “chemical security,” including dramatic maps showing “worst case scenarios” at particular sites around the United States. The American Chemistry Council, formerly called the Chemical Manufacturers’ Association, also maintains a website with an extensive collection of news articles, speeches and background documents on chemical security:
David Brinkerhoff (Reuters, June 2004), “Dow Investors Seek More Details on Bhopal Disaster”
This brief article describes shareholder activism at Dow Chemical on behalf of Bhopal gas victims.
Forgotten Benefactor of Humanity, Norman Borlaug
This article profiles Norman Borloug, the agronomist who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 for his contributions to the Green Revolution, particularly in India and Pakistan. Green Revolution techniques, which include inputs of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, have dramatically increased crop yields in many parts of the world, allowing countries such as India to achieve self-sufficiency in cereal grain production as early as 1974. The article tells this success story, providing an important backdrop to the story of the Bhopal disaster at a Union Carbide plant that manufactured the pesticide Sevin. The article briefly addresses critiques of the Green Revolution for its environmental impacts, and also briefly questions whether genetic engineering in agriculture will bring bout the “next” Green Revolution.
Mary Graham, “Regulation by Shaming”
This article describes the development of the right-to-know about environmental risk, and reliance on corporate disclosure as a risk management strategy. It provides historical perspective by describing the 1974 passage and subsequent impact of the Freedom of Information Act. It identifies the Bhopal disaster as a key motivation for increased disclosure expectations, embodied most specifically in the 1986 passage of the Community Right-to-Know Act. The Community Right-to-Know Act established the Toxic Release Inventory, which for the first time required disclosure of information electronically so that it could be easily shared.
Websites
International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal (ICJB), Social and Environmental Activists,
The ICJB is an umbrella organization for environmental and social justice activist groups around the world who have worked on issues related to the Bhopal disaster in the last twenty years. The organization includes Bhopal-based groups such as the Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Stationary Karmachari Sangh and Bhopal Group for Information and Action, and international NGOs such as Greenpeace. The site has an excellent archive of media coverage of Bhopal, and material to support the current campaign to clean up the abandoned factory in Bhopal, which is still polluting local water supplies. This site will provide up-to-date coverage of events commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Bhopal disaster in December 2004.
Union Carbide Corporation. Bhopal.com Information Center
This site provides Union Carbide’s version of the Bhopal disaster, including a brief “incident review,” a chronology of the aftermath of the disaster, a description and justification of the out-of-court settlement of the Bhopal case by the Indian Supreme Court, and a description of Union Carbide’s relief efforts in Bhopal. The site’s “information archive” also includes a widely circulated report by Ashok Kalelkar explaining the so-called “sabotage theory” that blames the disaster on the brief activities of one plant worker. The site notes that Union Carbide merged with Dow Chemical in February 2001.
Environmental Working Group, Chemical Industry Archives.
This website has short review essays of key topics (including Bhopal, Responsible Care and Right-to-Know) that include excerpts from primary documents, and links to many of these documents. The essays are very well done, and the links are excellent material for student research projects.
Environmental Defense Fund, Scorecard
This website makes use of a vast array of environmental risk information to support the public’s right-to-know about environmental risk. It relies heavily on data from the US EPA’s Toxic Release Inventory, which is linked to information on health effects. Users can type in their zip code to get different reports on their home communities. The site is an excellent way to draw students into analysis of pollution and environmental risk in their own communities. Note that awareness and legal support for the public’s right to know about environmental risk is one of the most important legacies of “Bhopal.”
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
Films
“The Road From Rio,” directed by Steve Bradshaw and Khalo Matabane
This 27 minutes video documents competing perspectives on what sustainable development is, and how it can be accomplished – as part of an assessment of the August 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development, held in Johannesburg, South Africa. The film provides historical perspective with brief descriptions of the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, and of the first international conference on the human environment, held in Stockholm in 1972. The story is partly told through the eyes of Nankie, a DJ on a Johannesburg community radio station. Views of the conference through this young woman’s eyes will heighten student interest in this video. The World Watch article “Journey to Johannesburg” will be a useful accompaniment to this video ()
Another World is Possible (2002), directed by Mark Dwoarkin and Melissa Young
This 24 minute, award-wining video showcases the 2002 World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, where 51,000 people from 131 countries came together to discuss how the world can be changed to better support all people and environmental sustainability. The event was convened in response to the World Economic Forum in New York. The speakers included Vandana Shiva, an Indian environmental and social justice activist with an international reputation. Reviewer and historian Jeremy Brecher compares the World Social Forum to the Continental Congress convened in England’s North American colonies in preparation for the American Revolution. A following World Social Forum was held in Bombay, India in January, 2004 (
Articles
Thomas Prugh and Erik Assadourian, “What is Sustainability Anyway?”
This World Watch article builds on the findings of the Biosphere II experiment – a 3.1 acre airtight greenhouse in the Arizona dessert established in 1991—to address a fundamental question: How do we make a self-contained place to live, and keep it going for a long time?
Websites
National Association of Environmental Professionals
This website includes book reviews focused on environmental management and sustainability, originally published in the journal Environmental Practice.
Friends of the Earth
FOE is a prominent international environmental NGO. Under “publications,” their website includes quarterly magazines and reports on a range of sustainability issues.
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN SOUTH ASIA
Franny Armstrong, “Drowned Out” (2002)
This 75-minute film documents the struggles of Indian villagers to deal with the massive Narmada Dam, one of the most controversial “development” projects in Indian in the last twenty years. The films focuses on one family from the submergence area who must decide whether to move into the slums of a nearby city, into a government supported re-settlement zone, or to stay home and drown. Bestselling author Arundhati Roy joins the fight against the dam and asks important questions: Will the water go to poor farmers or to rich industrialists? What has happened to the 16 million people already displaced by fifty years of dam building in India? Will the water go to poor farmers, to rich industrialists? Why should people around the world care about the Narmada case?
Patents and Patients (2003), directed by Joost de Haas
This 23 minute video tells the story of how CIPLA Pharmaceuticals, an Indian company, is trying to tackle the HIV/Aids pandemic in India and throughout the developing world through provision of generic copies of anti-retroviral drugs, which are otherwise too costly for use because the patents are held by giant pharmaceutical companies like Bristol Myers Squibb and Glaxo-SmithKline. Dr. Yusuf Hamied, Managing Director of Cipla, says in the film that 3500 new HIV/AIDS cases are reported almost daily in India, and that the total number of infected Indians may reach 35 million. The film effectively describes one way that intellectual property is shaping prospects for sustainable development, and how innovative companies are responding. The film also describes how drugs alone will not solve the HIV/Aids problem, describing how a robust health infrastructure is needed to monitor patients and ensure that drugs are properly administered. An explanation of how the HIV/Aids pandemic is a critical dimension of sustainability, in India and China in particular, is provided in a World Watch article titled “Aids has Arrived in India and China” (
It Takes a Village, directed by Ashley Bruch
This 23-minute film tells the story of an experimental community health center in a village in Bangladesh, build in the aftermath of a destructive cyclone in 1991. The film effectively demonstrates how community health projects can contribute to sustainable development, particularly in areas where, for historical reasons, people deeply mistrust outsiders, including representative of their own government. The film also shows how foreign aid alone will not solve community problems. This film can effectively follow discussion of the Bhopal disaster because of its focus on the challenge of re-building communities in the aftermath of disaster.
Articles
Multinational Monitor, “India: Open for Business”
A special, 1995 issue of the magazine Multinational Monitor devoted to analysis and critique of economic policy changes in India in the early 1990s.
Payal Sampat, “What Does India Want?”
This article describes competing visions of Indian development, beginning with the different visions of Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, and Mohandas Gandhi. The article describes how Nehru aspired to make India a leading industrial society, while Gandhi wanted to build India around village economies that would be relatively self-reliant through “appropriate technology.” In assessing how these visions have been taken up in the last fifty years, Sampat overviews the current state of India’ environment.
Websites
Government of India, Ministry of Environment and Forests
This website both explains basic sustainability issues, and provides information on various dimensions of India’s environment – pollution, agriculture, biodiversity, etc. Note that the “digital divide” is considered a sustainability issue. The site was originally developed through a United Nations Development Project (UNDP) initiative called the Sustainable Development Networking Programme.
Greenpeace India
Established in Canada in 1971, Greenpeace now has country offices around the world. Greenpeace India was established in the early 1990s.
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND CORPORATE RESPONSIBILITY
Films
“India Inhales”, directed by Amanda Rudman
This 25-minute video tells the story of how and why social justice activists have campaigned against tobacco companies that are targeting India as their new growth market. The film says that approximately 55,000 children in India start smoking every day, compared to 3,000 children in the United States, where the number of new smokers is falling. The video highlights the cynicism of tobacco companies in their construction of India, where 50% of the population is under the age of 25, as a solution to the problem of declining markets in the West. The producer of this program has collected extensive resources to supplement this video at
Articles
World Resources Institute Staff (1999), “Are Business and Industry Taking Sustainability Seriously”
This brief article describes “a growing trend to hold companies responsible for the environmental impacts of their products and services throughout their entire life-cycle,” in part through a “Polluter Pays Principle.”
Mallen Baker, “Arguments Against Corporate Social Responsibility”
This article provides a succinct list of common arguments against pro-active corporate social responsibility – by an advocate for corporate social responsibility. The article is part of a website that includes links to articles and case studies, and which offers a free email newsletter called “Business Respect. Mallen Baker is Development Director for Business in the Community, an umbrella organization of over 700 United Kingdom companies committing to having a positive impact on society. See