• The worldwide network of social relations and labor activities involved in the creation, distribution, consumption, and disposal of a commodity (defined as anything that can be bought and sold)
o Social relations: consumers, labor, capitalists, nation-states; and society/nature
o Commodity-chain activities: product design and financing; capture/extraction/cultivation of raw materials; processing; transportation; distribution/sale; purchase/consumption; and disposal
o Impacts: socioeconomic, political, environmental
o Questions
Culture of capitalism/global commodity chains
Karl Polanyi’s Paradox (as described in GPCC—not Michael Polanyi’s Paradox)
Negative externalities as expressed in Karl Polanyi’s Paradox
Internalizing negative externalities (cost internalization: more or less = “sustainability”)
• Example: “The coffee commodity chain is the linked sequence of activities involved in growing coffee, processing it, shipping it, roasting it, … selling it to consumers” (John Talbot) and disposing it.
• Video example: Coffee https://u.osu.edu/commoditychain2015/
• Scroll down for more examples of global commodity chains and negative externalities.
Final Essay Guidelines
• Choose either a specific commodity or some aspect of a commodity chain (such as its labor and/or ownership/control conditions; social, economic, environmental, and/or health consequences; waste disposal; consequences for political violence/wars; etc.).
• Emphasize relationships of consumption, labor, capitalists, nation-states, and the natural environment.
• I recommend the following essay structure:
o Paragraph #1
Global culture of capitalism: Very briefly—the rise of consumerism and its underlying causes (chapter one); how labor changed and the role of global labor segmentation (chapter two); how business organization changed, the industrial revolution, and colonialism and imperialism (chapter three and “King Leopold’s Ghost”); and the rise of the nation-state and its role as a building block of national and global capitalism (chapter four).
Karl Polanyi’s Paradox (as described in GPCC; not Michael Polanyi’s Paradox)
Negative externalities.
Challenges of internalizing externalities (cost internalization: more or less = “sustainability”)
o Paragraph #2: brief definition of “global commodity chain” and begin discussion of your specific topic.
o Continued paragraphs: discussion of your specific topic.
o Final/summary paragraph: Summary of your topic in view of (1) Karl Polanyi’s Paradox; (2) negative externalities; and (3) challenges of internalizing costs.
• 1000 or more words of narrative text (no maximum word count); college standards of writing;
• Double-spaced 11 or 12-point Times New Roman font; in-text citations; references section; Chicago, MLA, or APA format.
• If you want to focus on Covid-19 (or any other “signature” disease), scroll down for guidelines.
