Political Economy, the environment and economic crisis
August 21-24, 1999 Camp Chinqueka Bantam, Connecticut, USA
The volatility of today's markets, the world recession, and US trade wars (and other wars) are the result of growth policies gone awry in the race to produce for profit. The role of responsible stewardship of the world's resources and their just allocation is left behind. Environmentalists and political economists have overcome earlier antagonisms pitting nature against jobs and have begun forging new alliances to discuss a new sustainable way forward for workers who depend on the environment.
The three Plenaries and the David Gordon Lecture for this year's summer conference are a forum for how environmental issues are a necessary complement to radical political economic analysis of growth, distribution, and development. Names of confirmed speakers are:
Plenary 1: Moving Forward: Integrating Environmentalism and Political Economy
FRANK ACKERMAN Global Development and Environment Institute, Tufts University. Author of Why Do We Recycle? Markets, Values, and Public Policy and numerous other books and articles critiquing market incentives for environmental protections.
LAURIE TIPTON JOHNSON State University of New York, Albany. Environmental economist, long-time environmental activist and URPE Steering Committee member examines the links between environmental sustainability and equitable and fair economic and social change.
DUANE CHAPMAN Cornell University. Previously visiting faculty of University of Zimbabwe and University of Natal, Chapman's research ranges from political economy of environmental regulation to effects of heavy industries on environment in southern Africa.
PETER DORMAN Evergreen State College. Eco-socialist activist and teacher who will discuss the imperative and difficult task of restructuring the US economy for a sustainable future.
Environmentalists are often not political economists, and political economists are often not environmentalists. The first plenary reveals how each must understand the other in order to bring about broad-reaching social change. Speakers will present a primer on the language of environment and political economy. The speakers will outline the theory and logic behind sustainable growth strategies, discuss whether marketing of environmental goods and bads is effective and why, describe how progressive government policies can squash pollution and promote sustainable growth, and put forward an agenda for integrating political economy and environmentalism.
plenary 2: Confronting Capitalism: How Should the Global Economy Be Governed?
JAMES BOYCE University of Massachusetts, Amherst. His research focuses on how inequalities of wealth and power affect the distribution of environmental costs and the challenges to securing sustainable livelihood in developing countries.
Radhika Balakrishnan Marymount Manhattan College. Development economist who has worked for many years on issues of international trade, development, structural adjustment, and poor people's movements.
KEVIN GALLAGHER Global Development and Environment Institute, Tufts University. Author of critiques on mainstream trade and environment assumptions, and on the effects of NAFTA on pollution.
Political and economic institutions impose short-term, profit driven economic policies that dismiss concerns of environmental degradation and sustainable growth. Speakers discuss whether growth is a good or a bad, how the World Trade Organization impacts poor and environmentally degraded communities, and how industries move across borders to pollute.
plenary 3: STRUGGLES FOR ENVIRONMENTAL AND SOCIAL JUSTICE MIKE DAVIS Author of City of Quartz and Ecology of Fear, discusses how 'normal' capitalist development leads to racial and environmental injustice and disaster.
Ashok Gupta National Resource Defense Council. Energy economist and activist supporting indigneous rights in the James Bay community's struggle against dam development in Canada.
JOEL KOVEL Green Party Candidate for US Senate recounts challenges of building a grassroots political movement. Bard College
EBAN GOODSTEIN Lewis and Clark College. Author of Economics and the Environment textbook and organizer of the KYOTO NOW! student movement against global warming.
Activism on environmental issues is heating up along with global warming. The third plenary creates a forum to tell the stories of struggle of communities and individuals that choose to protect or sustain their environment against rapacious business interests. Speakers share their successes and challenges in building labor-environment coalitions, confronting energy projects imposed on Native American lands, and strengthening student movements to combat global warming.
Special Plenary: Graduate Student forum
Graduate students are being actively recruited and are encouraged to participate in a special plenary session on Sunday, August 22, in which each student will be asked to describe his/her area of interest and possible research topic to the audience (5-10 minute presentation per person). URPE members with experience in mentoring and teaching will also share their advice and suggestions for preparing dissertation proposals and getting dissertations completed. Scholarships will be provided to students who participate.
Graduate Student Scholarships
Half-price scholarships are being offered to graduate students who are interested in presenting in the Graduate Student Forum. If you present at the forum, the cost of your registration for food, lodging, and conference for 3 days is only $50. Please check off the scholarship box on the registration form, and send the description of your 5-10 minute talk to workshop organizer Susan Fleck, <susan_fleck at yahoo.com>.
Paper and Session Submissions
In addition to the plenaries, the organizers invite YOU to present papers, works in progress, or roundtables on current events. Workshops provide an opportunity for academics, activists, and students to present their work-in-progress for supportive discussion and critique. Proposals for individual papers will be considered, but the workshop organizers strongly encourage you to organize complete workshops. Please contact the workshop organizers, Susan Fleck <susan_fleck at yahoo.com>, and Laurie Johnson <tipton at csc.albany.edu>, with your proposals.
For those who present papers, you are invited to submit the paper to URPE's journal, the Review of Radical Political Economics, to be considered for inclusion in the RRPE's Papers and Proceedings issue for 2000.
We especially encourage graduate students to use the conference as an opportunity to present their work in a nonjudgmental atmosphere where their radical role models will also be attending.
Need-based Scholarships for Activists Available!!!!
Two scholarships are available for activists who would like to present but can not afford to pay the conference fees. To apply for a scholarship to cover the costs of attendance at the Summer Conference, you must write one paragraph describing your presentation/paper, with a statement indicating that you can not afford to pay the conference fees. Please include your name, address, and phone number. Scholarships will be awarded on a first-come first-serve basis. Send request for need-based scholarship to the URPE National Office.
Directions
Transportation by regional bus companies is available from New York City and Hartford, CT (closest town with bus service is Kent (via Danbury)). Upon arrival to Kent, call the Camp at 1-(860)-567-9678. The closest airport is the Bradley International Airport in Hartford. Camp Chinqueka is located off of US Route 202 at the entrance of Mt. Tom State Park between Bantam and New Preston, close to Litchfield, Connecticut.
For driving directions on the internet, go to <MAPS.yahoo.COM> and click on 'driving directions'. Enter your starting address and the destination address as Litchfield, CT. This should assist you in planning your driving itinerary.
We will also post a map on our internet site, <WWW.URPE.ORG> in the near future.
Odds and Ends
Please remember to bring your own bedding, towels, and flashlight. If you have any physical problems that require handicapped access, please contact the URPE National Office. We are interested in making the camp accessible to people who require handicapped access, and we are working with the camp owners to improve access.
Camp Chinqueka offers quiet, indoor classrooms so that serious intellectual work is possible. In addition, one can also enjoy the outdoor activities of soccer, canoeing, swimming and tennis. Evening fun includes dancing, singing, conversation with colleagues from across the country and food and drinks. Child care is provided as part of the conference costs, and Camp Chinqueka provides a fun and activity filled time for children of all ages. Join us at this relaxing, family-friendly camp where participants combine rich intellectual interplay with the wholesome fun of the outdoors. The Camp's phone number is: (860)-567-9678.
We look forward to seeing you! (Contact the URPE National Office at (203) 777-4605 or urpe at labornet.org if you have more questions.)