Work and Environmental Awareness at the Bottleneck of Global Trade: Perspectives of Port Workers on the Ecology of the Global Division of Labor. Conceptional Remarks and Preliminary Empirical Evidence

Ports are hubs of the global economy, handling around 80% of international trade. They connect economic areas, production sites and markets and secure the global supply of energy, raw materials, production inputs and consumer goods. At the same time, ports reveal the inequalities of the world market and the global division of labor. Many see the world market as an expression of structural dependencies between economically weaker countries of the 'Global South' and economically stronger industrialized countries of the 'Global North'.

The inequalities of the world market do not only concern macroeconomic issues. Flows of goods are always linked to material flows. Behind economic inequalities are therefore also ecological inequalities, which are linked to unequal access to natural resources and the unequal distribution of CO₂-emissions. The growth and prosperity models of the 'Global North' are therefore structurally linked to the expansive access to natural resources in other parts of the world. In ports and port work, therefore, not only economic but also ecological inequalities and environmental injustices of the global economy are condensed.

The targeted research project examines how employees in the port sector, who deal with the import and export of goods on a daily basis, perceive the ecological inequalities objectified in goods and linked to the world market. It explores the question of whether port workers develop environmental perceptions related to their position in the global division of labor. Do port employees in countries that are heavily dependent on the export of raw materials to industrialized countries think differently about the ecological inequalities of the global market than employees in seaports of industrialized countries that unload these raw materials and in return export highly processed goods to the 'Global South'? In the session I will present conceptional considerations and preliminary empirical evidence.