Back in high school the overall conservativeness of a suburban Catholic college prep school was occasionally broken up in interesting ways. One of them was my junior year course in Social Justice, taught by Ms. Lenie Schaareman, who was also the moderator of the World Affairs Club. She was someone firm in her convictions, willing to stand up for them, and not afraid to go against the tide. And so it should be no surprise that snotty high school students such as myself occasionally had a laugh at her expense. Sixteen-year-olds don’t really want to hear about how the World Bank and the IMF have affected international finance and the Third World economy. And we couldn’t quite understand why she was always going on about agribusiness.
Well, I’m a little older and a little wiser now. Globalization is a major buzzword and area of contention. I’m taking a Third World history course at the moment and trying to process the ways my buying habits ripple out to affect the world. (I have to in order to keep my Dewey merit badge.) And of course agribusiness crops up frequently. (Pun intended.) So I was happy to see Neil Sinhababu round up some links on the agribusiness issue over at Ezra Klein’s blog. There’s a good discussion in the comments, so check it out.