If Products Could Tell Their Stories Feb 8 2010

IF PRODUCTS COULD TELL THEIR STORIES TOWARDS A MODEL OF SUSTAINABLE DESIGN JEN VAN DER MEER NYU ITP WEEK 3: FEBRUARY 8 2010

RECALLED 2_2_2010

2_2_2010 Mark Parker, Nike’s president and chief executive, said the company had “ﬁnally ﬁgured out” it could use its knack for design and innovation to bring about environmental, labor and social change.

TODAY’S FOCUS: THE ROLE OF NGOs & ACTIVISTS IN BRINGING ABOUT A POSITIVE FUTURE _Semantics _Brief history of US environmental movement _Silent spring _Deep ecology _Inverted quarantine _Leverage points

REFRESHER: WEEK 1: Creators of products and services have a responsibility to know what’s in the stuff that we make.

REFRESHER: WEEK 2: Often, the greatest environmental impact is in the hands of the end consumer – use and disposal of products and services. To improve environmental impact, give consumers the tools to be better owners/operators of their stuff. Create Spimes.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL MOVEMENT USDA Mascot Woodsy Owl, September 1971.

1845: THOREAU WALDEN; OR LIFE IN THE WOODS 1864: YOSEMITE 1886: AUDUBON SOCIETY 1892: SIERRA CLUB – JOHN MUIR 1910: LAKEVIEW GUSHER SAN JOAQUIN, CA 1916: NAT’L PARK SERVICE 1948: DONORA, PA ZINC 1962: SILENT SPRING RACHEL CARSON

SILENT SPRING These sprays, dusts, and aerosols are now applied almost universally to farms, gardens, forests, and homes — nonselective chemicals that have the power to kill every insect, the “good” and the “bad,” to still the song of birds and the leaping of fish in the streams, to coat the leaves with a deadly film, and to linger on in soil — all this though the intended target may be only a few weeds or insects. Can anyone believe it is possible to lay down such a barrage of poisons on the surface of the earth without making it unfit for all life? They should not be called “insecticides,” but “biocides.” Rachel Carson

SILENT SPRING There is still very limited awareness of the nature of the threat. This is an era of specialists, each of whom sees his own problem and is unaware of or intolerant of the larger frame into which it ﬁts. It is also an era dominated by industry, in which the right to make a dollar at whatever cost is seldom challenged. When the public protests, confronted with some obvious evidence of damaging results of pesticide applications, it is fed little tranquilizing pills of half truth. We urgently need an end to these false assurances, to the sugar coating of unpalatable facts. It is the public that is being asked to assume the risks that the insect controllers calculate. The public must decide whether it wishes to continue on the present road, and it can do so only when in full possession of the facts. In the words of Jean Rostand, “The obligation to endure gives us the right to know.”

CARSON’S LEGACY Environmental Defense Fund (1967) EPA (1970) Clean Air Act (1970) DDT Ban (1972) Deep Ecology (1972) Arne Naess.

DEEP ECOLOGY Naess saw two different forms of environmentalism: Long-range deep ecology movement: deep questioning, down to fundamental root causes. Involves redesigning our whole systems based on values and methods that truly preserve the ecological and cultural diversity of natural systems. Without changes in basic values and practices, we will destroy the diversity and beauty of the world, and its ability to support diverse human cultures. Shallow ecology movement: stops before the ultimate level of fundamental change, often promoting technological ﬁxes (e.g. recycling, increased automotive efﬁciency, export-driven monocultural organic agriculture) based on the same consumption- oriented values and methods of the industrial economy.

1969: CUYAHOGA RIVER ON FIRE 1970: EARTH DAY 1970: NRDC FOUNDED 1971: GREENPEACE FOUNDED CANADA 1978: LOVE CANAL 1979: THREE MILE ISLAND 1981: PETA FOUNDED 1984: BHOPAL UNION CARBIDE 1985: VIENNA CONVENTION: OZONE 1986: CHERNOBYL 1989: EXXON VALDEZ 1992: EARTH SUMMIT RIO 1996: KATHIE LEE SWEATSHOP SCANDAL 1997: NIKE SWEATSHOP SCANDAL 2005: KATRINA 2006: AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH

“REGULATION WILL SAVE US” The environmental debate by NGOs had been framed as an issue that could only be dealt with through regulation, and public embarrassment of industry.

NGOs USE CAMPAIGNS TO GET RESULTS Not unlike a brand going through a process of advertising, NGOs pick speciﬁc issues to focus on, and they develop campaigns to get volunteers, the media, and constituents to become aware. The history of the environmental movement, the early years, relied on regulation as an end result. Business could not be trusted. Today, the changing of a business practice is often the aim. What NGO-based environmental campaigns can you recall?

APPLES AND ALAR

DOLPHIN SAFE TUNA

YES MEN

GREEN MY APPLE

THE DEATH OF ENVIRONMENTALISM Today's environmental leaders are addressing tomorrow's problems with yesterday's tools: regulatory and policy fixes. And because serious global problems like climate change and the looming water crisis have been narrowly defined as "environmental," their equally narrow solutions are easy to marginalize and dismiss by conservatives, cynics, and other nonbelievers. Environmental leaders need to "take a collective step back to rethink everything." Specifically: how to reframe issues and build coalitions around big ideas and values, not specific programs, much as the conservative movement has done over the past 40 years. _2004. Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus.

HOMEWORK The “green” consumer. What did you ﬁnd out?

SHOPPING OUR WAY TO SAFETY Environmentalism strives to ﬁre citizens up, get them to act collectively, politically; to organize and force real change. Environmental awareness does push many people toward activism, for sure, but we now see that environmental awareness can also lead to this other response, in which people act not as political subjects, not as citizens, but as consumers who seem interested only in individual acts of self-protection, in trying to keep contaminants out of their bodies. _Andrew Szasz

INVERTED QUARANTINE Traditional quarantine — diseased individual/healthy community. Inverted quarantine —diseased conditions/healthy individuals. The environment is toxic, illness inducing. Danger is everywhere. How are healthy individuals to protect themselves? They can do so only by isolating themselves from their disease-inducing surroundings, by erecting some sort of barrier or enclosure and withdrawing behind it or inside it. Inverted-quarantine products do not work nearly well enough to actually protect those who put their faith in them. But consumers believe they work. That belief, in turn, tends to decrease our collective will to truly confront serious environmental issues.

POLITICAL ANESTHESIA Feeling that one has successfully insulated oneself from an environmental threat, one feels no pain, no fear, no anxiety (maybe I should have called it "political anxiety relief"). It follows that one feels less urgency to do something about that particular threat.

SO THEN>>> Just as consumption and production were separated for the ﬁrst era of the industrial revolution, so were consumption and political action. Is it utopian to think that product manufacturing, marketing and communications will incorporate the political into the process of consumption, and reveal the commercial in the realm of the political.

LEVERAGE POINTS Places within a complex system where a small shift in one thing can produce a big change in everything. Systems thinkers note that complex organizations focuse on leverage points counter-intuitively, pushing them in the wrong direction. Thinking about… Obesity Mortgage crisis Unemployment Uninsured

PLACES TO INTERVENE IN A SYSTEM 12 Constants, parameters, numbers (subsidies, taxes, standards) 11 The sizes of buffers and other stabilizing stocks, relative to their flows 10 The structure of material stocks and flows (transport networks, population age structures) 9 The length of delays, relative to the rate of system change 8 The strength of negative feedback loops 7 The gain around driving positive feedback loops 6 The structure of information flows (who does/does not have access to info) 5 The rules of the system (incentives, punishments, constraints) 4 The power to add, change, evolve, or self-organize system structure 3 The goals of the system 2 The mindset or paradigm out of which the system aries 1 The power to transcend paradigms

STOCKS AND FLOWS Atmosphere National Debt

What leverage point is being used in the following examples:

SCORECARD.ORG

SF COMPOSTING + FINES

EPA CRIMINAL ENFORCEMENTS 2009 http://epa.gov/compliance/resources/reports/endofyear/eoy2009/2009criminalenfhighlights.html

NOKIA ECO SENSOR

TWITTER FOR TREES

VIRTUAL POLAR BEAR STUDY The polar bear is a powerful iconic symbol for many individuals, and its fate can be simply and directly connected to environmentally responsible behavior. Just as Tamagotchis evoked a powerful response from their owners, we hoped to use attachment to a virtual polar bear as a motivator for energy conservation. We ran a study exploring the impact of attachment on real-world actions. The results of our study suggest that an interactive virtual polar bear may increase environmentally responsible behaviors, especially when emotional attachment takes place. Motivating Environmentally Sustainable Behavior Changes with a Virtual Polar Bear Tawanna Dillahunt, Geof Becker, Jennifer Mankoff and Robert Kraut HCII, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA

DIGITALICSLATINO.ORG DigitalICS is a mobile phone application to fill out surveys, record audio and take pictures to monitor smallholder coffee farmers' compliance with organic, fair trade certifications and quality requirements.

THEFOODMAP

ECOSNOOP

NEXT CLASS: Readings: Shopping Our Way to Safety. Part III: Consequences of Inverted Quarantine. Chapters 6, 7, and Conclusion, pp. 169-238. Assignment: Start doing deep dive research into your chosen product to review, focused on product origin, and share your ﬁndings on your blog. Where is this product made? What were you not able to discover?

If Products Could Tell Their Stories Feb 8 2010

by Jen van der Meer on Mar 08, 2010

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If Products Could Tell Their Stories Feb 8 2010 — Presentation Transcript