Surveying the Chemical Anthropocene Chemical Imaginaries and the Politics of Defining Toxicity

Faced with the non-optional acceptance of toxic chemical artifacts, the ubiquitous interweaving of chemicals in our social fabric often exists out of sight and out of mind. Yet, for many, toxic exposures signal life-changing or life-ending events, phantom threats that fail to appear as such until th...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inEnvironment and society Vol. 12; no. 1; pp. 181 - 202
Main Author Hendlin, Yogi Hale
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published New York Berghahn Books 2021
Berghahn Books, Inc
Subjects
Agricultural chemicals industry
Anthropocene
Arbitration
Atrazine
Chemical industry
Conflicts of interest
Contamination
Environmental justice
Environmental toxicology
Ethical aspects
Glyphosate
Hazard assessment
Hazardous substances
Herbicides
International economic relations
Pesticides
Pesticides industry
Political activity
Political aspects
Publishing industry
Risk assessment
Safety
Sulphur industry
Surveys
Toxicity
Toxicology
New York
United Kingdom
California
United States
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Summary:Faced with the non-optional acceptance of toxic chemical artifacts, the ubiquitous interweaving of chemicals in our social fabric often exists out of sight and out of mind. Yet, for many, toxic exposures signal life-changing or life-ending events, phantom threats that fail to appear as such until they become too late to mitigate. Assessments of toxicological risk consist of what Sheila Jasanoff calls "sociotechnical imaginaries," arbitrations between calculated costs and benefits, known risks and scientifically wrought justifications of safety. Prevalent financial conflicts of interest and the socially determined hazards posed by chemical exposure suggest that chemical safety assessments and regulations are a form of postnormal science. Focusing on the histories of risk assessments of pesticides such as DDT, atrazine, PFAS, and glyphosate, this article critically reviews Michel Serres's notion of "appropriation by contamination."
ISSN:2150-6779
2150-6787
DOI:10.3167/ares.2021.120111