Rethinking the digital divide: from philanthropy to isonomia..

The digital divide has been, at least until very recently, a major theme in policy as well as interdisciplinary academic circles across the world, as well as at a collective global level, as attested by the World Summit on the Information Society. Numerous research papers and volumes have attempted to conceptualise the digital divide and to offer reasoned prescriptive and normative responses. What has been lacking in many of these studies, it is submitted, is a rigorous negotiation of moral and political philosophy, the result being a failure to situate the digital divide - or rather, more widely, information imbalances - in a holistic understanding of social structures of power and wealth. In practice, prescriptive offerings have been little more than philanthropic in tendency, whether private or corporate philanthropy. Instead, a theory of distributive justice is required, one that recovers the tradition of emancipatory, democratic struggle. This much has been said before. What is new here, however, is that the paper suggests a specific formula, the Rawls-Tawney theorem, as a solution at the level of analytical moral-political philosophy. Building on the work of John Rawls and R. H. Tawney, this avoids both the Charybdis of Marxism and the Scylla of liberalism. It delineates some of the details of the meaning of social justice in the information age. Promulgating a conception of isonomia, which while egalitarian eschews arithmetic equality (the equality of misery), the paper hopes to contribute to the emerging ideal of communicative justice in the media-saturated, post-industrial epoch.

Exploring the contradictions between Brazil’s role in the global climate change regime and its position in regional environmental governance.

Similar to other developing countries Brazil’s position on climate change emphasises national sovereignty and the principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities”. However, in recent years Brasilia has also announced voluntary reductions in carbon emissions, making Brazil one of the leading emerging countries in its approach to climate change, while enhancing its international reputation and legitimacy. Compared to its neighbours Brazil has older and more developed domestic environmental institutions and movements. Yet, Brazil’s global leadership on climate change does not translate into a similar role in regional environmental governance. In the 2000s Argentina and Uruguay became embroiled in a bitter environmental conflict involving a shared natural resource, the Uruguay River. Brazil not only refused to mediate, but also kept it out of regional forums insisting on the conflict’s bilateral nature. Furthermore, Mercosur’s environmental agenda has progressively become eroded while Brazilian-led Unasur lacks an institutional framework dedicated to environmental concerns. This indicates that environmental concerns are far more important for Brazil’s global image than for its role as a regional leader. It also highlights the limited scope of the climate change negotiations which focus narrowly on reducing carbon emissions, without taking wider concerns over energy generation or environmental and social justice into account. Brazil has promoted hydropower generation, portrayed as “clean” energy. Yet, these projects have sparked strong domestic and regional civil society opposition due to their social and environmental costs which make it difficult for Brazil to claim a regional leadership role on environmental concerns.