Examines the silicosis crisis in the South African mining industry, and reveals how the rate of, often fatal, tuberculosis among black migrant miners was hidden for over a century. South Africa's gold mines are the largest and historically among the most profitable in the world. Yet at what human cost? This book reveals how the mining industry, abetted by a minority state, hid a pandemic of silicosis for almost a century and allowed miners infected with tuberculosis to spread disease to rural communities in South Africa and to labour-sending states. In the twentieth century, South African mines twice faced a crisis over silicosis, which put its workers at risk of contracting pulmonary tuberculosis, often fatal. The first crisis, 1896-1912, saw the mining industry invest heavily in reducing dust and South Africa became renowned for its mine safety. The second began in 2000 with mounting scientific evidence that the disease rate among miners is more than a hundred times higher than officially acknowledged. The first crisis also focused upon disease among the minority white miners: the current crisis is about black migrant workers, and is subject to major class actions for compensation. Jock McCulloch was a Legislative Research Specialist for the Australian parliament and has taught at various universities. His books include Asbestos Blues. Southern Africa (South Africa, Namibia, Lesotho, Swaziland & Botswana): Jacana

This open access book charts how South Africa’s gold mines have systematically suppressed evidence of hazardous work practices and the risks associated with mining. For most of the twentieth century, South Africa was the world’s largest producer of gold. Although the country enjoyed a reputation for leading the world in occupational health legislation, the mining companies developed a system of medical surveillance and workers’ compensation which compromised the health of black gold miners, facilitated the spread of tuberculosis, and ravaged the communities and economies of labour-sending states. The culmination of two decades of meticulous archival research, this book exposes the making, contesting, and unravelling of the companies’ capacity to shape – and corrupt – medical knowledge.

How race became embedded in a medical instrument In the antebellum South, plantation physicians used a new medical device—the spirometer—to show that lung volume and therefore vital capacity were supposedly less in black slaves than in white citizens. At the end of the Civil War, a large study of racial difference employing the spirometer appeared to confirm the finding, which was then applied to argue that slaves were unfit for freedom. What is astonishing is that this example of racial thinking is anything but a historical relic. In Breathing Race into the Machine, science studies scholar Lundy Braun traces the little-known history of the spirometer to reveal the social and scientific processes by which medical instruments have worked to naturalize racial and ethnic differences, from Victorian Britain to today. Routinely a factor in clinical diagnoses, preemployment physicals, and disability estimates, spirometers are often “race corrected,” typically reducing normal values for African Americans by 15 percent. An unsettling account of the pernicious effects of racial thinking that divides people along genetic lines, Breathing Race into the Machine helps us understand how race enters into science and shapes medical research and practice. Honorable Mention, 2017 Rachel Carson Prize, Society for the Social Studies of Science Winner of the 2018 Ludwik Fleck Prize from the Society for Social Studies of Science

The most comprehensive book to date on the history of silicosis and the strategies used to combat it. Despite the common perception that “black lung” has been relegated to the dustbin of history, silicosis remains a crucial public health problem that threatens millions of people around the world. This painful and incurable chronic disease, still present in old industrial regions, is now expanding rapidly in emerging economies around the globe. Most industrial sectors—including the metallurgical, glassworking, foundry, stonecutting, building, and tunneling industries—expose their workers to lethal crystalline silica dust. Dental prosthodontists are also at risk, as are sandblasters, pencil factory workers in developing nations, and anyone who handles concentrated sand squirt to clean oil tanks, build ships, or fade blue jeans. In Silicosis, eleven experts argue that silicosis is more than one of the most pressing global health concerns today—it is an epidemic in the making. Essays explain how the understanding of the disease has been shaken by new medical findings and technologies, developments in industrializing countries, and the spread of the disease to a wide range of professions beyond coal mining. Examining the global reactions to silicosis, the authors trace the history of the disease and show how this occupational health hazard first came to be recognized as well as the steps that were necessary to deal with it at that time. Adopting a global perspective, Silicosis offers comparative insights into a variety of different medical and political strategies to combat silicosis. It also analyzes the importance of transnational processes—carried on by international organizations and NGOs and sparked by waves of migrant labor—which have been central to the history of silicosis since the early twentieth century. Ultimately, by bringing together historians and physicians from around the world, Silicosis pioneers a new collective method of writing the global history of disease. Aimed at legal and public health scholars, physicians, political economists, social scientists, historians, and all readers concerned by labor and civil society movements in the contemporary world, this book contains lessons that will be applicable not only to people working on combating silicosis but also to people examining other occupational diseases now and in the future. Contributors: Alberto Baldasseroni, Francesco Carnevale, Éric Geerkens, Martin Lengwiler, Gerald Markowitz, Jock McCulloch, Joseph Melling, Julia Moses, Paul-André Rosental, David Rosner, Bernard Thomann

On the occasion of the centenary of the International Labour Organization (ILO), this 11th volume of International Development Policy explores the Organization's capacity for action, its effectiveness and its ability to adapt and innovate. The collection of thirteen articles, written by authors from around the world, covers three broad areas: the ILO’s historic context and contemporary challenges; approaches and results in relation to labour and social protection; and the changes shaping the future of work. The articles highlight the progress and gaps to date, as well as the context and constraints faced by the ILO in its efforts to respond to the new dilemmas and challenges of the fourth industrial revolution, with regard to labour and social protection. Contributors include: Juliette Alenda-Demoutiez, Abena Asomaning Antwi, Zrampieu Sarah Ba, Stefano Bellucci, Thomas Biersteker, Filipe Calvão, Gilles Carbonnier, Nancy Coulson, Antonio Donini, Christophe Gironde, Karl Hanson, Mavis Hermanus, Velibor Jakovleski, Scott Jerbi, Sandrine Kott, Marieke Louis, Elvire Mendo, Eric Otenyo, Agnès Parent-Thirion, Sizwe Phakathi, Paul Stewart, Kaveri Thara, Edward van Daalen, Kees van der Ree, Patricia Vendramin, and Christine Verschuur.

South Africa's gold mines are the largest and historically among the most profitable in the world. Yet at what human cost? This book reveals how the mining industry, abetted by a minority state, hid a pandemic of silicosis for almost a century and allowed miners infected with tuberculosis to spread disease to rural communities in South Africa and to labour-sending states. In the twentieth century, South African mines twice faced a crisis over silicosis, which put its workers at risk of contracting pulmonary tuberculosis, often fatal. The first crisis, 1896-1912, saw the mining industry invest heavily in reducing dust and South Africa became renowned for its mine safety. The second began in 2000 with mounting scientific evidence that the disease rate among miners is more than a hundred times higher than officially acknowledged. The first crisis also focused upon disease among the minority white miners: the current crisis is about black migrant workers, and is subject to major class actions for compensation. Jock McCulloch was a Legislative Research Specialist for the Australian parliament and has taught at various universities. His books include 'Asbestos Blues'. Southern Africa (South Africa, Namibia, Lesotho, Swaziland & Botswana) : Jacana.

Mine areas left behind by companies that no longer exist are defined as derelict mines – those that were operated and closed at a time when most countries did not have adequate regulations requiring rehabilitation of the impacted mine areas. This book provides unique information on the extent and severity of derelict mines’ impact on environmental degradation and human and environmental health. It examines the nature of derelict mines, short-term and long-term risks to sensitive receptors, tools for monitoring and prioritizing risks, and technological advances for rehabilitation. This book considers a risk-based approach to managing derelict mines, which is reliable and cost-effective. FEATURES Provides fundamental information on derelict mines and their inventory in different countries Explains risk-based management of derelict mines and the importance of community perspectives as a reliable and cost-effective method Identifies ownership and liability issues through many case studies in Australia and other countries that must deal with the remediation of derelict mines Presents remediation, assessment, and predictive tools for managing pit lakes Helps readers set standards, regulatory measures, and policies related to mine closures This book is for engineers and professionals who work in mining, geology, chemistry, mineralogy, geotechnics, and hydrogeology and deal with industrial site management, waste management, mine closures, mine site reclamation, derelict mine remediation, and mine revegetation. It is also an insightful resource for graduate students, academics, and researchers focused on these courses.

The Routledge Handbook of Environmental History presents a cutting-edge overview of the dynamic and ever-expanding field of environmental history. It addresses recent transformations in the field and responses to shifting scholarly, political, and environmental landscapes. The handbook fully and critically engages with recent exciting changes, contextualizes them within longer-term shifts in the field, and charts potential new directions for study. It focuses on five key areas: Theories and concepts related to changing considerations of social justice, including postcolonial, antiracist, and feminist approaches, and the field’s growing emphasis on multiple human voices and agencies. The roles of non-humans and the more-than-human in the telling of environmental histories, from animals and plants to insects as vectors of disease and the influences of water and ice, the changing theoretical approaches and the influence of concepts in related areas such as animal and discard studies. How changes in theories and concepts are shaping methods in environmental history and shifting approaches to traditional sources like archives and oral histories as well as experiments by practitioners with new methods and sources. Responses to a range of current complex problems, such as climate change, and how environmental historians can best help mitigate and resolve these problems. Diverse ways in which environmental historians disseminate their research within and beyond academia, including new modes of research dissemination, teaching, and engagements with stakeholders and the policy arena. This is an important resource for environmental historians, researchers and students in the related fields of political ecology, environmental studies, natural resources management and environmental planning. Chapters 9, 10 and 26 of this book are freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

Mining has played a key role in the growth of many towns in South Africa. This growth has been accompanied by a proliferation of informal settlements, by pressure to provide basic services and by institutional pressures in local government to support mining. Fragile municipal finance, changing social attributes, the pressures of shift-work on mineworkers, the impact on the physical environment and perceived new inequalities between mineworkers, contract workers and original inhabitants have further complicated matters. Mining growth has however also led to substantial local economic benefits to existing business and it has contributed to a mushrooming of new enterprises. While the relationship between mining and economic development at the country level has received adequate attention in existing literature, less is known about the consequences of mining at the local level. This book investigates the local impacts of mining in South Africa, focusing on employment, inequality, housing, business development, worker well-being, governance, municipal finance, planning and the environment. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, Mining and Community in South Africa will be of interest to scholars of South Africa, economic development, labour and industry, politics and planning.