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Environment
Alice Mah, Professor of Sociology, University of Warwick

The plastic crisis has deep corporate roots: to protect our planet, they need to be exposed

David Michaels Environment Pollution
Plastic pollution is a growing global problem. Shutterstock

This spring, I taught a new undergraduate course in environmental sociology. Most of my students took the course because they were curious to see what their desire to live more sustainably had to do with sociology.

By the third week – after a deep dive into the troubling connections between fossil capitalism (the dependence of capitalism on fossil fuels), waste colonialism (the unjust international trade and disposal of hazardous waste between countries) and environmental injustice – a few students said glumly that they had thought the course would be more optimistic.

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