In 1924, IBM built its first plant in Endicott, New York.

Now, Endicott is a contested toxic waste site.

Yet despite the efforts of IBM and the U.S. government to clean up the site, Endicott residents remain skeptical that the mitigation systems employed were designed with their best interests at heart.

In Toxic Town: IBM, Pollution, and Industrial Risks (NYU Press, 2014) Peter C. Little, who teaches at Oregon State University, tracks and critically diagnoses the experiences of Endicott residents as they learn to live with high-tech pollution, community transformation, scientific expertise, corporate-state power, and risk mitigation technologies.

Little explores questions of theoretical and practical import for understanding the politics of risk and the ironies of technological disaster response in a time when IBM’s stated mission is to build a “smarter planet.”

Little argues for a political ecology of corporate social and environmental responsibility and accountability that places the social and environmental politics of risk mitigation front and center.

Little says that we will need much more than hollow corporate taglines, claims of corporate responsibility, and attempts to mitigate high-tech disasters to truly build a smarter planet.

Little argues that on the techno-economic surface, IBM’s promises to build a “smarter planet” sounds promising.

“But, deliver this message of corporate progress and prowess on  a loudspeaker in downtown Endicott, where IBM planted the seeds for its empire of business and innovation, and chances are the message falls on ears of distrust, discomfort, and even disgust,” Little writes.

“In the spirit of one Endicott resident and former IBMer who has struggled to live a comfortable life in IBM’s contaminated birthplace, the following words mark the real active ingredient of this book: ‘I just want people to know. People need to know there is a problem here. People need to know that it ain’t gonna be covered up. They try to make everything look nice by mitigating, but there is a big problem here. The fact is, IBM took a dump on this community. They messed up, big time.”