Sharon Beder - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Books by Sharon Beder

Pluto Press, London; UNSW Press, Sydney; The Oriental Press, China, 2009

This Little Kiddy Went to Market investigates the way that corporations are strategically shaping... more This Little Kiddy Went to Market investigates the way that corporations are strategically shaping children to be hyperconsumers, submissive employees, and passive, unquestioning citizens as well as feeding a burgeoning pharmaceutical industry by ensuring children who cannot be shaped are given a psychiatric diagnosis.

It covers the way that corporations are targeting ever younger children with a barrage of advertising and marketing; the way that children’s play has been turned into a commercial opportunity; and how corporations have taken advantage of childish anxieties and insecurities, and reshaped children’s very identities. It shows how school funding shortages have opened the door to an influx of corporate materials into schools aimed at inculcating consumer and business values.

The book analyses school reforms in English-speaking nations to uncover the hidden agendas behind them including: shifting of responsibility for the consequences of funding shortages to school management; turning schools into competing business enterprises where children are drilled and constantly tested; producing submissive employees with basic literacy and numeracy skills rather than developing an informed active citizenry with critical thinking skills; enabling businesses to take control of more and more aspects of schooling; and eroding the ideal and reality of public schooling.

Biodiversity banks, emissions trading, fishing quotas, water rights. A whole new suite of environ... more Biodiversity banks, emissions trading, fishing quotas, water rights. A whole new suite of environmental policy instruments are being introduced in Australia and around the world. But can policies designed primarily to facilitate economic growth also protect the environment? Are they fair and equitable? Do they fit with the precautionary principle? Are they putting human rights at risk? These are the questions which Sharon Beder's latest book, Environmental Principles and Policies sets out to answer.

Environmental Principles and Policies examines six key environmental and social principles that have been incorporated into international treaties and national laws. It uses them to evaluate the new wave of economic-based and market-based policy instruments that are currently being introduced in many nations.

This book differs from other texts on environmental policy-making as a result of its critical and interdisciplinary approach. Rather than merely setting out policies in a descriptive or prescriptive way, it analyses and evaluates policy options from a variety of perspectives. This enables students and general readers not only to gain a thorough grasp of important principles and current policies, but also to be able to apply the principles and critically evaluate them.

Best-selling author Sharon Beder unleashes a penetrating exposé of how corporations are crafting ... more Best-selling author Sharon Beder unleashes a penetrating exposé of how corporations are crafting the global agenda for their own benefit at the expense of billions of people, the environment and democracy.

In this brilliantly researched exposé, ‘communications Rottweiler’ Sharon Beder blasts open the backrooms and boardrooms to expose how the international corporate elite dictate global politics for their own benefit. Beder shows how they created business associations and ‘think tanks’ in the 1970s to drive public policy, forced the worldwide privatization and deregulation of public services in the 1980s and 1990s (enabling a massive transfer of ownership and control over essential services) and, still not satisfied, have worked relentlessly since the late 1990s to rewrite the very rules of the global economy to funnel wealth and power into their pockets.

Want a globalized and homogenized world of conflict, poverty and massive environmental degradation run by a corporate oligarchy that wipes its feet on democracy? Or a democratic world, where poverty is history, companies work for people and clean water is a right not a privilege you pay for? Beder’s message is clear - it’s your world, and it’s time to fight for it.

In her recent book Suiting Themselves, bestselling author Sharon Beder exposed how the global cor... more In her recent book Suiting Themselves, bestselling author Sharon Beder exposed how the global corporate elite have brazenly rewritten the rules of the global economy to line their pockets. In this new book she trains her sights on the insidious underbelly of this global trend to show how they have also orchestrated a mass propaganda campaign to manipulate community values and convince us that their interest – co-opting and controlling all of us in the name of the free market – is in our interest During the 20th century, business associations coordinated mass propaganda campaigns combining 20th century American PR methods with revitalized free market ideology from 18th century Europe. The insidious aim was to persuade people to eschew their own power as workers and citizens, and forego their democratic power to restrain and regulate business activity. Sophisticated corporate-funded think tanks augmented these campaigns in the 1970s and 80s, promoting free enterprise and business-friendly policies.

These ‘free market missionaries’ now seek to change individual and institutional values through bolder strategies such as the expanding share ownership and manipulating wider public concerns. In the end the outcome is the same, the triumph of business values over community values and the manipulation of democracy. Beder’s is an intellectual call to arms: fight back or be converted to the ideology of the free market missionaries.

Noted author Sharon Beder argues persuasively that the track record of electricity privatisation ... more Noted author Sharon Beder argues persuasively that the track record of electricity privatisation and deregulation around the world indicates that it is a confidence trick. Her book shows how simplistic ideology and economic theory have been used to mask the pursuit of self-interest; how control of electricity has been wrested from public hands to create profit opportunities for investors and multinational corporations; and how an essential public service has been turned into a speculative commodity in the name of ‘reform’.

Power Play explores the battles between private and public ownership in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia since the early twentieth century, and the agenda-setting and public relations strategies involved. It investigates the way that developing countries such as Brazil and India have been forced to allow foreign investors to exercise a stranglehold over their electricity systems. And it uncovers the campaigns waged by think tanks, corporate interests, and multinational companies such as Enron to swindle the public in dozens of countries out of rightful control over an essential public service.

Global Spin reveals the sophisticated techniques being used around the world by powerful conserva... more Global Spin reveals the sophisticated techniques being used around the world by powerful conservative forces to try to change the way the public and politicians think about the environment. Large corporations are using their influence to reshape public opinion, to weaken gains made by environmentalists, and to turn politicians against increased environmental regulation.

The corporations' techniques include employing specialized PR firms to set up front groups that promote the corporate agenda whilst posing as public-interest groups; creating 'astroturf' - artificially created grassroots support for corporate causes; deterring public involvement by imposing SLAPPS-strategic lawsuits against public participation; getting corporate-based 'environmental educational' materials into schools; and funding conservative think-tanks, which have persistently tried to cast doubt on the existence of environmental problems and to oppose stricter environmental regulations.

In the media, corporate advertising and sponsorship are influencing news content, and industry-funded scientists are often treated as independent experts. In the shops, 'green marketing' is being used to reassure consumers that corporations are addressing serious environmental problems.

Global Spin shows how, in a relentless assault on democracy and its institutions, the massive, covert power of large corporations has enabled corporate agendas to dominate the international debate about the state of the environment and the most effective means of solving environmental problems.

At the onset of the twenty first century work and production have become ends in themselves. The ... more At the onset of the twenty first century work and production have become ends in themselves. The resulting material affluence is accompanied by increasing levels of stress, insecurity, depression, crime, and drug taking. Escalating production and consumption are also destroying the environment on which life itself depends. Yet employment has become such a priority that much environmental degradation is justified merely on the grounds that it provides jobs. And people are so concerned to keep their jobs that they are willing to do what their employers require of them even if they believe it is wrong or environmentally destructive.

The social benefit of having the majority of able-bodied people in a society working hard all week goes unquestioned, particularly by those who work hardest. Few people today can imagine a society that does not revolve around work. How did paid work come to be so central to our lives? Why is it that so many people wouldn't know what to do with themselves or who they were if they did not have their jobs?

In this major new book, Sharon Beder unearths the origins and the practices of a triumphant culture of work in which the wealthy are respected and inequality is justified. Dr Beder shows that these values are neither natural nor inevitable. They have been actively promoted – through religious preaching, corporate propaganda, the education system, and socialisation – by those who benefit most from them.

Selling The Work Ethic provides an absorbing account and critique of this central aspect of modern capitalist society. Prompted by her conviction that humanity needs to unlearn and change these powerfully held but now pathological values if we are to reverse the declining quality of life in industrial society, Dr Beder illuminates the impasse we are now in.

The image and status of the engineering profession is declining as the public identifies engineer... more The image and status of the engineering profession is declining as the public identifies engineers with controversial and environmentally damaging technologies. Engineers are too often characterised as being male, socially inept, politically naive and aligned with selfserving developers. They are finding themselves at the centre of controversies they don't fully understand. Increasingly engineers are subjected to law suits because the public, which has an unrealistic perception of the nature of engineering, blames them when things go wrong.

Engineering appears to be at a turning point. It is evolving from an occupation that provides employers and clients with competent technical advice to a profession that serves the community in a socially and environmentally responsible manner. Increasingly engineers themselves and their professional societies aspire to be broadbased professionals. Employers are also requiring more from their engineering employees than technical proficiency.

Engineering in the modern world involves many social skills. There is also an increasing need for engineers to choose technological solutions that are appropriate to their social context and to give consideration to the longterm impacts of their work, if only because the work of engineers can have wideranging effects. Today's technologies can impact on the whole globe and they can impact on future generations. Never before has there been such a moral imperative to consider what may have been thought of as unintended consequences in the past.

This book sets out to provide a resource to help engineering students understand the social dimensions and context of engineering work as well as the social role and responsibilities of the new engineer. Part One canvasses the issues and develops the debates central to a discussion of engineering in contemporary society. Part Two shows how those debates are put into action with a detailed case study highlighting most of the key concerns for the new engineer, while Part Three develops the general discussion about engineers and the environment, engineering ethics, and engineers at risk. It also seeks to stimulate discussion within the profession about the qualities of the new engineer and to provide insights to nonengineers who have an interest in the shaping and implementation of technology in modern society.

In recent years, the term `ecologically sustainable development' has acquired motherhood status. ... more In recent years, the term `ecologically sustainable development' has acquired motherhood status. Everyone--governments, the business lobby, environmental groups--is in favour of it. But it seems to mean different things to different people. Is ESD the future we have to have? Is it an oxymoron? Or is it, perhaps, a trojan horse--a green light for developers?
Here is the second, up-to-date edition of a clear, comprehensive text which unpicks and analyses the main issues and problems embedded in the notion of ESD. The book carefully examines the way ESD is used, the concepts it straddles, and whether it can or will protect the environment. Key issues dealt with in depth include the relationship between the economy and the environment, the techniques of environmental valuation and pricing, the costs and benefits of regulation, local and global equity implications, the uses and limitations of technological solutions, and the roles of businesses, governments and consumers.

The text is divided into five main sections, with a case study at the end of each section dealing respectively with mining, biological diversity, industrial waste in the ocean in NSW, the greenhouse effect, and the car.

Our beaches have become open sewers. Each day a billion litres of nearly raw sewage mixed with to... more Our beaches have become open sewers. Each day a billion litres of nearly raw sewage mixed with toxic industrial waste are dumped into the sea off Sydney right next to much-loved places like Bondi and Manly, fouling bathing waters and causing fish contamination.
Who is turning the Australian coastline into a dump for toxic and infectious waste and why are they doing it? How have they managed to get away with it? Why are valuable tourist resources in both Australia and New Zealand beign destroyed by sewage pollution.
Toxic Fish and Sewer Surfing uncovers a sorry story of shortsightedness, deceit and collusion. It reveals the true state of affairs behind the phoney public relations campaign designed to reassure an increasingly sceptical public.

Papers by Sharon Beder

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Review(s) of: Engaging the Community: A Handbook for Professionals Managing Contaminated Land, Co... more Review(s) of: Engaging the Community: A Handbook for Professionals Managing Contaminated Land, Cooperative Research Centre for Contamination Assessment and Remediation of the Environment, by L. Heath, S.J.T. Pollard, S.E. Hrudey and G. Smith, March 2010, 90pp., $35.