ABSTRACT
In the fall of 1978, Business and Society Review published an article by Barry Castleman entitled "How we export dangerous industries." Castleman's argument was direct and shocking:
Not since the National Association of Manufacturers had issued its ominous caveats about the passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Act had we heard such a broadsweeping warning about the effects of regulation. Not even conservative economists in their concern about "overregulation" had warned of catastrophic capital flight from the US. Of course, Castleman was arguing as an environmentalist, not a proponent of laissez-faire capitalism. He hoped, we
suspect, to enlist the self-interest of American workers in a worldwide effort to control environmental pollution by threatening vast employment effects in regulating countries unless effective international controls on hazard-generating industries were developed. The success of Castleman's tactics is evident: labor is sufficiently concerned to participate in this conference. Perhaps our greatest concern, however, should be that some curious bedfellows are using global environmental concerns to threaten what small protection has been gained through passage of federal occupational safety and health legislation.
