Bhopal Disaster - Essay Example

Section/# Bhopal: Crisis and Responsibility The worst chemical disaster that the modern world has yet seen took place in India in the year 1984. Union Carbide, a now defunct company, was producing pesticides within its industrial facility in Bhopal Madhya Pradesh when an explosion caused a release of hydrogen cyanide. The subsequent release formed a low lying cloud of gas that engulfed the shantytown in and around the industrial zone and affected the deaths of thousands within the local community. The true extent of the loss of life is still a hotly contested issue. For purposes of this research analysis, the author will assume that in excess of 8,000 people died from the immediate effects of the gas as well as health complications caused by exposure to the release. Regardless of the overall loss of life or the nature of the explosion that caused the subsequent release, the pertinent business issue associated with such a horrifying event is seeking to determine culpability for the tragedy. As such, this essay will discuss overall culpability as well as seek to define where ownership begins and culpability ends. Before delving into such a topic and seeking to weigh economic costs and benefits, the author of this piece feels incumbent to reiterate the sheer scale of this disaster so that the reader might not in any way seem to misunderstand that this analysis has not taken into full account the suffering and loss of life that such a careless and poorly managed disaster has effected on countless rural and working poor in Bhopal, India (Bloch 2012). As such, although this analysis will seek to determine the overall level to which a business entity should be held responsible for a tragedy of epic proportions, such an analysis will seek to address both moral and ethical issues associated with the Bhopal crisis without merely focusing on the positive and negative business factors that could affect such a decision. Only days after the Bhopal disaster, CEO of Union Carbide was testifying before the United States Congress exalting the “commitment to safety” that Union Carbide has exhibited in the past and plans to exhibit in the future with reference to ensuring such an incident would never occur again. Ultimately, Union Carbide agreed to pay over 300 million USD to the victims of the Bhopal disaster as a means to attempt to evade any further litigation surrounding the matter. However, due to the sheer size and scope of the Bhopal tragedy, such a sidestep was impossible (Kripalanin 2008). Eventually, the legal ramifications of the Bhopal disaster forced Union Carbide to divest itself entirely of its Indian holdings and sell of the remainder of its operations within the subcontinent. As such, many individuals, both within India and within the remainder of the world thought that a likely end to the legal wrangling surrounding the Bhopal incident would likely draw to a close. However, this was not the case. Due to the sheer size en horror of the incident, it remained indelibly seared onto the minds of the populace and government entities within India. As a function of this, when DOW chemical bought some of the components that originally constituted Union Carbide in 2002, many officials within the Indian government as well as human rights activists that had closely monitored the legal back and forth between Union Carbide and its affiliates in the wake of the disaster began to make immediate demands upon DOW chemical to don the mantle of responsibility for the disaster (Ali 2012). Eager to have a recognizable MNC at the helm of the now defunct portions of Union Carbide, many believed that DOW should be responsible for the final remediation and civic responsibility associated with the Bhopal disaster. At the risk of sounded calloused and with a long and storied reputation to uphold, DOW chemical found itself at a severe impasse. Rather than outright denying the claim and risking alienating key shareholders within one of the fastest growing markets in the world, DOW found itself in a position of walking a tightrope between seeking to acknowledge the horror of the overall disaster while at the same time seeking to distance itself from any type of responsibility with relation to Union Carbide and the disaster that occurred long before DOW obtained any interest in the former components of Union Carbide. This issue speaks to a broader ethical problem that surrounds wrongdoing and legal responsibility for firms that take over the helm of companies who have allowed such disasters to take place under their watch. However, according to the law, the level to which a new owner can be held responsible for actions and processes that they had no purview over and occurred long before the acquisition took place is highly limited. However, the issue is further differentiated by what sociologists and business ethical analysts refer to as “critical mass”. If the DOW name and that of its affiliates can be convincingly and strongly attributed to the Bhopal disaster in the court of public opinion, it will necessitate the firm responding at least in some way to the allegations that have been made (Sheoin 2009). With respect to this critical mass of public sentiment, the nature of the legal responsibility that DOW Chemical may have with relation to the Bhopal tragedy comes as a secondary concern with respect to the level of attribution that public perception can connect with the firm, ownership of Union Carbide, and the ultimate share of responsibility that continues to be generated as a function of the incomplete response of Union Carbide to the incident when it originally occurred (Zavestoski 2009). In this way, DOW Chemical finds itself in a precarious position of attempting to distance itself from the tragedy while all the while convincing key shareholders and consumers that DOW Chemical will behave in a more empathetic manner to the concerns of the population and the environment than did its predecessor. This incident helps to point to a number of key concerns that a multi-national company might encounter with regards to ethics concerns and the legalities associated with acquiring components of a company that experienced a bit of a sordid past. Naturally DOW Chemical did not anticipate that certain shareholders within the Indian government and population would attempt to hold their firm responsible, at least in small part, of the Bhopal disaster, this indeed occurred and highlights the nuanced nature of multinational corporations doing business within nations that have had a less than favorable experience with past instances. Moreover, this particular incident has enveloped DOW Chemical with a host of negative publicity that it would otherwise have liked to have ignored. As such, the response by DOW Chemical necessitated that it both express a sense of sorrow and concern for the victims of the worst industrial accident in the history of the world while at the same time attempting to distance itself from those that were actually responsible for the chain of events and oversights that led to the Bhopal incident. Accordingly, the business issue that this incident has brought to the mind of the reader engages him/her with the knowledge that oftentimes in the court of public opinion, ultimate responsibility is not what a firm can lean upon and must therefore include a healthy measure of concern for the ways that key shareholders might see a given issue and work to ascribe a level of responsibility where legally none would otherwise exist. Even though DOW Chemical was able to successfully avoid ultimate responsibility for the disaster, the damage to its reputation within the hearts and minds of Indian shareholders will likely take a great deal of time to rectify. References Ali, A., Nawaz Khan, A., & Farrukh Moin, M. (2012). PROBABLY THE BIGGEST TRAGEDY IN THE INDUSTRIAL HISTORY OF ASIA: A STORY OF UNION CARBIDE, BHOPAL, INDIA. Interdisciplinary Journal Of Contemporary Research In Business, 4(2), 763-765. BLOCH, K. K., & JUNG, B. B. (2012). The Bhopal disaster. Hydrocarbon Processing, 91(6), 73-76. Kripalani, M. (2008). Dow Chemical: Liable for Bhopal?. Businessweek, (4087), 61-62. Sheoin, T. (2009). Waiting for Another Bhopal: Global Policies to Control Toxic Chemical Incidents. Global Social Policy, 9(3), 408-433. doi:10.1177/1468018109343645. Zavestoski, S. (2009). The Struggle for Justice in Bhopal: A New/Old Breed of Transnational Social Movement. Global Social Policy, 9(3), 383-407. doi:10.1177/1468018109343643 Read More