We need to talk about Intel: Foreign Direct Investment and Environmental Justice

Critical Ecologies

In this podcast, John Bohan asks: who are the polluters, the big energy consumers, the tax dodging tech giants, the water devourers in our communities? Why do I see the Intel logo all about North Kildare? What’s the craic with that factory by the river? When the benevolent corporate presence in my community says they’re committed to maintaining “environmental stewardship” and “provide jobs and investment in the community, what do they mean by that?

We need to talk about Intel.

We live on an island overrun by tax dodging and resource ravenous multinationals, with a state dedicated to their profit at any cost. Saving our planet and climate systems is going to mean more than just “taxing the polluters”, but if we’re to win in any form of struggle it will have to happen on, and be organised at, a community level. We need to understand what a corporation like Intel does at an everyday level - how they are tangibly placed within our communities and what they do with the power and influence they have built for themselves. There’s a sleeping antagonism in the community here, between the needs of a profit driven multinational like Intel and the needs of the community.