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Arabica Robusta

Just in case you haven't had Enough of the conflict minerals debate… - Chris ... - 0 views

chrisblattman.com/...flict-minerals-debate%E2%80%A6

rights intervention industry human extractive enough corporate congo coltan cellphones

shared by Arabica Robusta on 14 Aug 10 - Cached
  • Their central point, I believe, boils down to this: conflict minerals might not be the most effective policy change, but it’s the policy we can change most effectively.
  • This is a simple quantity argument. It may or may not be true. But estimating demand shocks is one of the oldest and simplest tools in the economic toolbox. Has anyone done this calculation? A good econ grad student could pump it out. In the absence of evidence, signs point to a small potential impact. (There is hope, though. A commenter argues that manufacturers are the wrong ones to target, but that the market has a real choke point: processors. If true, these are the details we want to be sure the legislation gets right.)
  • Second, even if the potential impact is modest, there’s a good argument for the legislation if they have a high probability of success. Here there is another clear argument from Enough: There are numerous other pressure points that the international community should help address… But the conflict minerals issue resonates with a potent group of actors in the United States, namely, advocates and concerned consumers who do not want their purchases to fund armed groups in Congo, a handful of dedicated members of Congress and leaders in the Obama administration who see a lasting solution to the Congo conflict as part of their personal priorities and legacies, and increasingly, leaders in the electronics industry itself, which is responding to the moral and consumer pressure to take on this issue. For a small advocacy organization, we would stop here. For one of the largest and most influential human rights campaigners in the country, I hope for more. This is Enough, after all, not Good Enough. Let’s campaign for policies that are powerful, not just popular. Enough has mentioned peacekeeping support among a host of tougher, more effective-seeming solutions. Are these so unattainable?
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • What I’m really trying to get to is that monitoring, the law and audits, along with public shaming, have almost certainly got as far as they’re capable of getting in hte supply chain and I cannot see Enough as doing anything other than creating lots of jobs for people authorised by Enough to work as supply chain auditors…to no effect other than a paycheque.
  • China is the world’s largest consumer of tin, and most of the smelting happens in southeast Asia. However, most of the trading companies that purchase Congolese tin ore are based in Europe – Amalgamated Metal Corp (AMC) used to buy around half of the Kivu’s tin production, and Belgium-based Traxys and Trademet buy a fair chunk of the rest. Pressure them last year had a significant impact: they suspended all exports from the Kivus after allegations that they were indirectly financing rebel groups. While they may very well try to hide behind front companies in BRIC countries, that might eventually be more of a nuisance than just complying with basic due diligence.
  • due diligence and sanctions for non-compliant companies could provide the necessary incentive structures for companies and the Congolese state to strengthen their regulatory agencies, clear the soldiers out of the mines and render the trade more accountable and transparent. That could then finally prompt companies to invest in industrial tin mining in the Kivus – the Bisie polygon in particular – which would in turn cut out a lot of the crooked middlemen and militias that currently benefit from the trade and who parasitize the Congolese state.
  • The important fact is not the size of the Congolese market to the global market. The important fact is the size of the companies affected by the legislation to the producers (exporters/processors).
  • On the second point, I think you missed a key component. There is a background constraint to the equations you did, which is what can be done by the US. ENOUGH worked on a policy that resonated with US constituencies AND was directly material to the US Congress AND could be implemented through US legislation. So they can’t just advocate for any policy at all, but policies that are relevant in the US. Importantly, you ignore that ENOUGH does campaign on all sorts of other issues, including support for peacekeepers. This is not absent from their campaign materials. It was absent from the legislation, because that clearly would not be material to a financial reform bill. This is also a matter of facts. We can see ENOUGH’s support for peacekeepers, and we will see that in the future. On point three, it is not a question of facts. It is clearly stated as a counterfactual. “What if Congress doesn’t pay attention to other important issues?” I’m not sure what facts one can appeal to. I also find it highly unlikely that this legislation will distract Congressional attention from other DRC issues in the future. I suspect it is much more likely that it will RAISE the profile of the DRC in foreign affairs issues for Congress as a result of extensive lobbying. The “advocacy space” is not fixed. In fact, it might be expanded by the result of lobbying. But regardless, there is no “fact” to appeal to resolve this argument. Finally, Jason is right that the legislation creates an incentive structure for responsible supply chains, which in the long run will likely be a good thing.
  • An unintended consequence of this legislation will be the increased cost of doing business and possible end of doing business with 9 other African countries who may transship some Congolese material but also produce their own. If economies in the 9 other African countries listed in this law are injured as a consequence and livelihoods reduced then instability and poverty are the results of this well intentioned and poorly crafted legislation. Instability and poverty that could well lead to increased civil conflict in those countries.
  • Arabica Robusta on 14 Aug 10
     
    Their central point, I believe, boils down to this: conflict minerals might not be the most effective policy change, but it's the policy we can change most effectively.
Arabica Robusta

The true cost of your new Christmas laptop? Ask the eastern Congolese | Madeleine Bunti... - 0 views

www.guardian.co.uk/...mas-congo-electronic-companies

congo coltan human extractive rights industry intervention cellphones corporate enough instability

shared by Arabica Robusta on 19 Dec 10 - No Cached
  • Eastern Congo's hell is an instance of how globalisation generates ungovernable spaces. Where there is a collision of desperate poverty, plentiful guns and a world greedy for natural resources, a brutal chaos results. To combat that, it takes a very tenacious sort of global campaigning – bringing to attention each element of the system and the part it can play in leveraging change – and mercifully, that is what is now finally starting to happen.
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