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Brian Tokar. Earth for Sale: Reclaiming Ecology in the Age of Corporate Greenwash. Boston: South End Press, 1997.
Brian Tokar provides one of the most extensive and convincing analyses of corporate greenwashing. Earth for Sale demonstrates how mainstream environmental organizations have opted for compromise and accommodation as corporate donations flow into environmental organizations such as the Sierra Club, the Audubon Society, and the National Wildlife Federation.
These mainstream environmental organizations receive funding from corporations with horrendous environmental records. The Sierra Club receives donations from ARCO. Amoco, Chevron, Du Pont, Dow Chemical, Exxon, Mobile, Monsanto, Tenneco, and Waste Management Corporation fund the Audubon Society and the National Wildlife Federation. In addition to corporate funding, three foundations (Pew Charitable Trusts, W. Alton Jones Foundation, and Rockefeller Foundation) bankroll these mainstream environmental organizations.
The Pew Charitable Trusts has extensive investments in chemical companies, oil exploration, timber, mining, and arms manufacture. The W. Alton Jones Foundation's investments include holdings in FMC Corporation, the controversial goldmining giant, and Maxxam, a company that is attempting to clear-cut the largest single expanse of old growth. The Rockefeller Foundation has investments in 28 oil and gas development companies and timber companies such as Weyerhauser and Boise Cascade. As a consequence of these funds, the political direction of the mainstream environmental organizations has been fundamentally altered. Corporations and foundations control the purse strings, and the organizations tow the donors' line. These organizations follow the top-down style of management similar to the corporations. During the rightward shift in the political climate in the United States, the mainstream environmental organizations followed suite. Although there were internal battles within these organizations, especially the Sierra Club, Tokar maintains that the advocates promoting the corporate funding strategy won.
In addition to the extensive corporate funding of mainstream environmental groups, Tokar points out...