Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Global Issues

This debate-style reader is designed to introduce students to controversies in global issues through readings that reflect a variety of viewpoints. Each issue is framed with an issue summary, an issue introduction, and a postscript. The Taking Sides readers feature annotated listings of selected World Wide Web sites. Taking Sides is supported by our student website, Dushkin Online (www.dushkin.com/online/).

PART 1. Global Population

ISSUE 1. Should the International Community Attempt to Curb Population Growth in the Developing World?

YES: Robert S. McNamara, from “The Population Explosion,” The Futurist (November–December 1992)

NO: Steven W. Mosher, from “McNamara’s Folly: Bankrolling Family Planning,” PRI Review (March/April 2003)

Robert S. McNamara, former president of the World Bank, argues that the developed countries of the world and international organizations should help the countries of the developing world to reduce their population growth rates. Steven W. Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute, an organization dedicated to debunking the idea that the world is overpopulated, argues that McNamara’s World Bank, and other international financial lending agencies, has served for over a decade as "loan sharks" for those groups and individuals who were pressuring developing countries to adopt fertility reduction programs for self-interest reasons.

ISSUE 2. Is Rapid Urbanization in the Developing World a Major Problem?

YES: Barbara Boyle Torrey, from “Urbanization: An Environmental Force to Be Reckoned With,” Population Reference Bureau (April 2004)

NO: Gordon McGranahan and David Satterthwaite, from “Urban Centers: An Assessment of Sustainability,” Annual Review of Energy and the Environment (vol. 28, 2003)

Barbara Boyle Torrey, a member of the Population Reference Bureau’s Board of Trustees and a writer/consultant, argues that extremely high urban growth rates are resulting in and will continue to create a range of negative environmental problems. Gordon McGranahan and David Satterthwaite suggest that there is little research about urban centers and their ability to provide sustainable development.

ISSUE 3. Is Global Aging in the Developed World a Major Problem?

YES: The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), from Meeting the Challenge of Global Aging: A Report to World Leaders from the CSIS Commission on Global Aging (CSIS Press, 2002)

NO: Phillip Longman, from “The Global Baby Bust,” Foreign Affairs (May/June 2004)

The CSIS Report, "Meeting the Challenge of Global Aging: A Report to World Leaders from the CSIS Commission on Global Aging" suggest that the wide range of changes brought on by global aging pose significant challenges to the ability of countries to address problems associated with the elderly and to the national economy as a whole. Phillip Longman takes a more balanced perspective, suggesting that what he calls the coming "baby bust" will yield a variety of positive consequences as well as negative ones.

PART 2. Global Resources and the Environment

ISSUE 4. Do Environmentalists Overstate Their Case?

YES: Ronald Bailey, from “Debunking Green Myths,” Reason (February 2002)

NO: David Pimentel, from “Skeptical of the Skeptical Environmentalist,” Skeptic (vol. 9, no. 2, 2002)

Environmental journalist Ronald Bailey argues that the natural environment is not in trouble, despite the arguments of many environmentalists that it is. He holds that the greatest danger facing the environment is not human activity but "ideological environmentalism, with its hostility to economic growth and technological progress." David Pimentel, a professor of insect ecology and agricultural sciences, argues that those who contend that the environment is not threatened are using data selectively and that the supply of basic resources to support human life is declining rapidly.

ISSUE 5. Is Environmental Degradation Worsening?

YES: United Nations Environment Programme, from Global Environment Outlook 2000 (Earthscan, 1999)

NO: Peter Huber, from “Wealth Is Not the Enemy of the Environment,” Vital Speeches of the Day (April 1, 2000)

The United Nations Environment Programme presents a comprehensive and gloomy assessment of the global environment at the turn of the millennium. Peter Huber, a senior fellow of the Manhattan Institute, contends that humankind is saving the Earth with the technologies that the “soft greens” most passionately oppose.

ISSUE 6. Should the World Continue to Rely on Oil as a Major Source of Energy?

YES: Hisham Khatib et al., from World Energy Assessment: Energy and the Challenge of Sustainability (United Nations Development Programme, 2000)

NO: Lester R. Brown, from “Turning on Renewable Energy,” Mother Earth News (April/May 2004)

Hisham Khatib, honorary vice chariman of the World Energy Council and a former Jordanian minister of energy and minister of planning, and his coauthors conclude that reserves of traditional commercial fuels, including oil, “will suffice for decades to come.” Lester Brown, former head of the Worldwatch Institute, suggests in this adaptation from his Plan B: Rescuing a Planet Under Stress and a Civilization in Trouble, that there is good news about the global shift to renewable energy.

ISSUE 7. Will the World Be Able to Feed Itself in the Foreseeable Future?

YES: Sylvie Brunel, from “Increasing Productive Capacity: A Global Imperative,” in Action Against Hunger, The Geopolitics of Hunger, 2000–2001: Hunger and Power (Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2001)

NO: Lester R. Brown, from “Eradicating Hunger: A Growing Challenge,” in Lester R. Brown et al., State of the World 2001 (W. W. Norton, 2001)

Sylvie Brunel, former president of Action Against Hunger, argues that “there is no doubt that world food production… is enough to meet the needs of” all the world’s peoples. Lester R. Brown, former president of the Worldwatch Institute, maintains that little, if any, progress is being made to eradicate pervasive global hunger, despite increases in food productivity.

ISSUE 8. Is the Threat of Global Warming Real?

YES: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, from “Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis,” A Report of Working Group I of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2001)

NO: Christopher Essex and Ross McKitrick, from Taken by Storm: The Troubled Science, Policy and Politics of Global Warming (Key Porter Books, 2002)

In the summary of its most recent assessment of climatic change, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concludes that an increasing set of observations reveals that the world is warming and that much of it is due to human intervention. Christopher Essex and Ross McKitrick, Canadian university professors of applied mathematics and economics, respectively, attempt to prove wrong the popularly held assumption that scientists know what is happening with respect to climate and weather, and thus understand the phenomenon of global warming.

ISSUE 9. Is the Threat of a Global Water Shortage Real?

YES: Mark W. Rosegrant, Ximing Cai, and Sarah A. Cline, from “Global Water Outlook to 2025: Averting an Impending Crisis,” A Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute and the International Water Management Institute (September 2002)

NO: Bjørn Lomborg, from The Skeptical Environmentalist: Measuring the Real State of the World (Cambridge University Press, 2001)

Rosegrant and colleagues conclude that if current water policies continue, farmers will find it difficult to grow sufficient food to meet the world’s needs. Water is not only plentiful but also a renewable resource that, if properly treated as valuable, should not pose a future problem.

PART 3. Expanding Global Forces and Movements

ISSUE 10. Can the Global Community "Win" the Drug War?

YES: Federico Mayor in collaboration with Jérôme Bindé, from “Winning the Fight Against Drugs: Education, Development and Purpose,” The World Ahead: Our Future in the Making (UNESCO, 2001)

NO: Harry G. Levine, from “The Secret of Worldwide Drug Prohibition,” The Independent Review (Fall 2002)

Mr. Mayor, former director-general of UNESCO, suggests that drug trafficking and consumption "constitute one of the most serious threats to our planet" and the world must dry up the demand and attack the financial power of organized crime. Harry G. Levine, professor of sociology at Queens College, City University of New York, argues that the emphasis on drug prohibition should be replaced by a focus on "harm reduction," creating mechanisms to address tolerance, regulation, and public health.

ISSUE 11. Is Globalization a Positive Development for the World Community?

YES: Timothy Taylor, from “The Truth About Globalisation,” Public Interest (Spring 2002)

NO: Jose Bove, from “Globalisation’s Misguided Assumptions,” The OECD Observer (September 2001)

Mr. Taylor argues that globalization is not the boogeyman that some scholars and politicos contend but rather a complex array of economic trends that provides positive results for the vast majority of people. Mr. Bove contends that globalization and the capitalist principles that underlie it are misleading and create inequalities and myths regarding progress and wealth creation that are not supported by an analysis of the facts.

ISSUE 12. Will the Digital/Computer World Pose a Threat to Our Individual Privac...