While this piece isn't a formal part of my series on the shifting global order, it explores a key dynamic underpinning that change: the uncomfortable realities of modern interdependence. We often speak of "values" and "progress" in the West, but our lifestyles are sustained by global systems that rely on exploitation, fragility, and denial. This essay is not a moral reckoning, but a strategic observation: any serious conversation about the future must begin by acknowledging the contradictions of the present.
The Age of Virtue and Consumption
In Britain and the West today we seem to be going through a sort of moral purge. We obsess over being on the right side of history as we revisit the darker elements of our own story. A kind of moral clarity has grown out of this historical revisionism. We are convinced that our ancestors were wrong and that we now possess a moral purity and intellectual superiority they could only have dreamed of.
This process has inevitably led to much modern moral posturing on slavery, colonialism, and climate change. You don't need to go far to find examples: a polite conversation at a dinner party, or the endless doom-loop of conventional news coverage. Museums and country houses alike now come with lectures on the colonial past. Statues have been toppled, reparations demanded.
But here is the question: can a society that depends so heavily on exploitation to power its lifestyle really claim the moral high ground? We cast judgement on the supposed sins of our ancestors while tapping out our denunciations on devices built in conditions that they—and indeed we, if we cared to look—would find appalling.
The True Cost of an iPhone
The extraordinary device we all carry in our pockets is built on the backs of exploited labour. Apple's main assembler in China, Foxconn, has faced repeated reports of harsh working conditions: excessive overtime, verbal abuse, limited toilet breaks, and workers standing for more than 12 hours a day.
In 2010 alone, 14 workers at Foxconn committed suicide. The situation was so disturbing that the company installed nets outside buildings to catch jumpers and made workers sign pledges not to kill themselves. This is not hyperbole—it is a modern Dickensian nightmare.
Wages in many Asian factories remain as low as $1 to $2 per hour—far below any notion of a living wage in the West. As a result, Apple's profit margin on an iPhone 16 is estimated to be between $500 and $600, while the device retails for over $1,000. Imagine what this technology would cost if it were manufactured entirely in the UK. It would likely be unaffordable to the average earner.
Blood in the Circuitry: Raw Material Extraction
And that only covers assembly. What about the raw materials that go into batteries and microchips? Many are mined in the developing world under appalling conditions.
Cobalt: Seventy percent of the world's cobalt—a vital element for iPhones, laptops, and EV batteries—comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo. Tens of thousands of children are estimated to work in these mines. In places like Kolwezi, tunnels regularly collapse. Workers inhale toxic dust, and protective gear is almost nonexistent.
Lithium: The Lithium Triangle of South America—Chile, Bolivia, and Argentina—holds more than half the world's known lithium reserves. The extraction process requires enormous volumes of fresh water, often in arid, drought-prone regions. In Chile's Atacama Desert, mining consumes 65% of the region's water, severely impacting local farmers and indigenous communities.
Coltan: Another little-known but critical mineral is coltan, used in capacitors across all modern electronics. Much of it is mined in Central Africa under brutal conditions. There is compelling evidence that coltan mining directly funds militias and warlords, fuelling violence in regions already torn by civil conflict. A 2021 UN report identified links between coltan smuggling and arms trafficking.
In short, our thirst for sleek electronics is underwriting bloodshed.
The Carbon Mirage of the Electric Car
Electric cars are growing in popularity, and I don't blame those who buy them—especially with government incentives and urban driving patterns that make EVs practical. But it is questionable for governments to be pushing these vehicles as aggressively as they do.
A Tesla Model 3, for example, generates 15 to 20 tonnes of CO2 before it even touches the road, mostly through battery production. Many of the rare earth elements used are refined in China, often in coal-powered plants. Once these vehicles arrive in Europe, the continent lacks sufficient green energy infrastructure to support them.
The overall strategy appears not just short-sighted but hypocritical, especially when the primary producers of batteries are regimes that do not share our supposedly sacrosanct liberal values.
Planned Obsolescence: The Eternal Upgrade
Then there is the matter of waste. Consumer culture thrives on the constant upgrade cycle. Each year, a sleeker phone arrives, rendering last year's model obsolete. In 2022 alone, Europe generated 11 million tonnes of e-waste.
Apple and its peers don't help: devices are deliberately hard to repair, with batteries soldered in place. Apple even faced lawsuits for deliberately slowing down older phones to encourage upgrades.
This problem extends beyond electronics. Flimsy flat-pack furniture and fast fashion items are designed to be disposable. It feeds the cash flow of businesses while driving environmentally harmful production.
You simply can't beat a 200-year-old wardrobe for durability, craftsmanship and carbon capture.
Greenwashing and Guilt-Washing
Corporations consciously model their businesses around these habits, and why not? The consumer is addicted to cheap goods and the latest tech. Corporate PR soothes our consciences without asking us to change our behaviour.
- BP launched a 'carbon footprint calculator' to shift blame from industry to individuals
- H&M and Zara introduced 'green' collections which only expanded their overproduction
- Apple promises carbon neutrality by 2030, even as it continues sourcing materials from exploited regions
'Sustainability' has become a marketing term—a balm for the guilty consumer.
The Hypocrisy of Western Values
We moralise about the past while turning a blind eye to the present. Statues fall. Apologies are made for slavery and empire. But their modern equivalents—sweatshops, child labour, digital colonialism—are accepted or ignored.
There is a kind of wilful ignorance at play. We are horrified by forced labour in the 18th century, but indifferent to the fact that our iPhones could not exist without it today.
Conclusion: A Call for Humility
Reading this back, it might sound like a leftist anti-corporate op-ed. That is not the intention. I own an iPhone, and like most people in the West, I participate in the systems I describe. But recognising one's place in the system is not the same as endorsing it. Just as I acknowledge that our ancestors acted within the frameworks of their time, I understand that we, too, operate within constraints—economic, technological, and cultural.
This is not a call for moral purity. The world is unjust, and few of us are able to stand entirely outside it.
But if we are unwilling to face the realities of our own consumption, perhaps we should speak with a little less sanctimony about the sins of others.
Moral relativism is not some obscure philosophy—it is the default setting of the modern consumer. What we need is less moral outrage, and more moral introspection.