ABSTRACT
Some measure of the enormity of unintended outcomes of contemporary popular culture was the “10-mile-wide flotilla” of 6 million plastic bags found floating in the Pacific Ocean in 2002. Fallen from a container ship, the bags became a vast pollutant instead of packaging for purchases at fast-food restaurants in California (Hayden 2002: 58). Many of the institutions, instruments and practices that have defined contemporary popular culture have led to questionable, even disastrous effects, such as this one. Automobile accidents and their resulting deaths are daily news in most countries. Air pollution and the profligate use of non-renewable resources have given rise to new agencies of protest, like the Green Party in Germany and the Sierra Club in the United States. In the “throw-away” economy, waste management has ironically become a new growth industry in most of the developed world. Critics have urged a shift to a sustainable economy or what Worldwatch has called a “reuse/recycle economy” (website “Worldwatch” 1998: 1).
