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The answer lies in Politics. If a multinational is ruining your beaches / water supply / air quality / whatever, use the power of government to apply regulation

The answer lies in Politics. If a multinational is ruining your beaches / water supply / air quality / whatever, use the power of government to apply regulations and taxes. One common argument against that is that a company will simply go to another place which offers friendlier regulations. In that case, good riddance. Now, if someone depends on those multinationals for a better living and have no options otherwise, then they gotta pay up one way or the other. Typical path we have seen is for societies to get rich first and then start demanding nicer things like clean air / water.

shard972 8y ago
Which society stands to become richer? The country that sold it's beaches to a foreign company, or the foreign country which operates the business and owns the profits? To the extent this is politics, I guess you could say it's a battle between liberalism which would see the situation as efficient and the result of free capitalistic action while a nationalist perspective would lead you to see the beaches are apart of the nation itself and cannot simply just be sold off.
- RestlessMind 8y ago
  When played smart, the answer can be both - the country willing to pollute its environment and the country which is outsourcing the "pollution". For example, China and the USA.
discordance 8y ago
That's not possible as regulation from government always lags commercial damage. Governments are often complicit in the damage to begin with. See The Great Barrier Reef [1] for example. The Australian government has done little to protect it while exempting mining companies from damages, approving dredging and generally being climate change denialists. 1: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2018/08/explore-atlas-great-barrier-reef-coral-bleaching-map-climate-change/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2018/08/explore-...

shard972 8y ago

Which society stands to become richer? The country that sold it's beaches to a foreign company, or the foreign country which operates the business and owns the profits? To the extent this is politics, I guess you could say it's a battle between liberalism which would see the situation as efficient and the result of free capitalistic action while a nationalist perspective would lead you to see the beaches are apart of the nation itself and cannot simply just be sold off.

RestlessMind 8y ago
When played smart, the answer can be both - the country willing to pollute its environment and the country which is outsourcing the "pollution". For example, China and the USA.

discordance 8y ago

That's not possible as regulation from government always lags commercial damage. Governments are often complicit in the damage to begin with. See The Great Barrier Reef [1] for example. The Australian government has done little to protect it while exempting mining companies from damages, approving dredging and generally being climate change denialists. 1: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2018/08/explore-atlas-great-barrier-reef-coral-bleaching-map-climate-change/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2018/08/explore-...