Social Environmentalism and Native Relations

Green Web Bulletin #50

By David Orton

There are two possible courses to affluence. Wants may be 'easily satisfied' either by producing much or desiring little. (Marshall Sahlins, Stone Age Economics, 1972.)

Introduction: Left Biocentrism

The main focus of this article is on critiquing social environmentalism in relation to native issues from a left-biocentric perspective. As an Earth defender I define myself interchangeably as a "left biocentrist" or a "left ecocentrist". (Biocentric is a term which has had a long movement life and is widely used but ecocentric is more encompassing and includes the landscape.) The left biocentric tendency represents a left focus within the deep ecology movement. See Bulletin #49 for a fuller discussion of "Left Biocentrism". This is a real emerging theoretical tendency although presently appearing under various names, e.g. radical ecocentrism, deep green theory, ecologism, etc. Although the terminology and content of the left biocentric tendency are tentative and yet to be collectively outlined, it should be understood that 'left' in this biocentric context means anti-capitalist but not necessarily socialist. Thus while some left biocentrists consider themselves socialists, as I do myself, some do not. When fundamental choices have to be made in my own consciousness, the 'left' is subordinate to the 'green'. This is why I am part of the Earth First! ecological movement. All left biocentrists would consider radical deep ecology a subversive philosophy, with goals that cannot be fulfilled within industrial capitalism.

There is agreement among left biocentrists that industrial capitalism has to go—both industrialism and capitalism. But the nature of its replacement is the subject of continuing thinking and discussions. Other theoretical tendencies within the environmental and green movements such as social ecology, ecological Marxism and ecofeminism, while raising important questions, are not biocentric but remain human-centered in their fundamental orientations.

Non-biocentric environmentalists who are influenced by the left/socialist/ communist/Marxist tradition of social justice, usually stress economic/ social/cultural justice for humans, over biocentrically defined all-species environmental justice. The ultimate subordination of non-human animal and plant life and the Earth itself to a human agenda, is taken as a given. At the philosophical level, the world view of class struggle is human-centered, not Earth-centered. 'Ownership' of the Earth by humans is accepted. Disputes are over which classes or groups of humans, including indigenous peoples, should have ownership, and how the benefits should be distributed.

I personally continue to believe that the communist/socialist promise of social justice through economic redistribution, remains necessary and valid today for the human species. So a transformed anti-industrial "socialism" could still be relevant, if it incorporated justice for non-human species, was against economic growth and consumerism, and was for human population reduction and a frugal lifestyle.

Being consciously left and expressing this in one's writings has not been particularly popular within the ecocentric stream of the North American environmental and green movements. Working within a capitalist framework, e.g. paying "commissions" to individuals to raise funds for radical environmental organizations, is mostly taken for granted. Many U.S. Earth Firsters, who have been weaned on a Cold War capitalist culture of anti-communism and who have drunk at the anarchist anti-communist watering hole, need to become open to the positive contributions of the socialist movement for promoting social justice. This openness does not cancel-out criticizing the anti-biocentric nature of industrial socialism.

Social Environmentalism

While both social and environmental issues are crucial to address for left biocentrists, environmental issues are more fundamental than social issues. Left biocentrists believe that an egalitarian non-discriminatory society, a highly desirable goal, can still have an anthropocentric exploitive attitude towards the Earth. As I show in this article, for many left-wing environmentalists, social justice is upheld over environmental justice. Social ecology and eco-feminist beliefs help buttress this position. These beliefs hold that human-to-human relations within society are more important and, in the final analysis, determine society's relationship to the natural world. So from this social ecology/eco-feminist perspective, clearly the priorities for 'environmental' organizers are social, not environmental relationships. This anthropocentric tendency, enhanced by involvement with aboriginal peoples in various "solidarity" campaigns, is not usually explicitly articulated. It can be called social environmentalism. It is time for social environmentalism to be lifted into consciousness among environmental activists. It is necessary to ask whether the underlying assumptions of social environmentalism should be supported. Not having the ability to rationally assess a situation is fatal to activism.

Social environmentalism is to be found for example, in the Native Forest Network (I am the Canadian Maritimes contact), the Taiga Rescue Network, Canada's Future Forest Alliance, the government-funded Canadian Environmental Network, in some EF! Journal articles, and among most aboriginal organizations involved in environmental issues. Many non-native social environmentalists who work with aboriginals define themselves as "advocates" for indigenous interests. Some directly work, or do their main organizing work, for indigenous organizations.

Social Environmentalism And Aboriginal Relations

In Canada, regarding environmental/native relations, social environmentalism implicitly or explicitly promotes the following views:

• Aboriginals in Canada "owned" the country before the arrival of the European colonizers and therefore must be compensated. With this position, ownership of non-human Nature becomes accepted.
• Because of support for past treaties, that is, "treaty fundamentalism", feudal/bourgeois legalities are upheld and a class view of history is denied. This is expressed by upholding as valid treaties of oppressor convenience signed 200-300 years ago, e.g. the Treaty of 1752 or the Royal Proclamation of 1763. Yet the historical context for the above treaties shows the British colonialists understanding of democracy, with the expulsion of the Acadians from Canada in 1755, and the war declared in 1776 to try and defeat the American Declaration of Independence. There was no "democracy", as we understand this concept in a contemporary sense, in 18th century English society. In that century, the king (there was one queen) made policies which were exercised through ministers of the crown. Why should British colonial treaties signed with indigenous peoples be taken as sacrosanct today?
• The "unceded" land concept or "beyond the treaty frontier" language, promulgated by many land claims proponents in B.C., and appearing in many environmental articles, thereby seems to convey the past legitimacy of the whole treaty process in Canada. Implied is that if a treaty was signed by the British colonial power dispossessing the native peoples, and presumably lived up to, then everything is okay! Non-native social environmentalists who use the "beyond" language, will often at the same time be supporting native "sovereigntists". Such sovereigntists do not accept the past, or present legitimacy of the whole treaty or land claims process, as expressed through organizations like the British Columbia Treaty Commission, which the majority of that province's Indian bands are engaged with. (The "sovereigntists" of Gustafsen Lake in the summer of 1995 did, however, through their lawyer Bruce Clark, appeal to the Queen of England and the British Privy Council.) From a federal or provincial government viewpoint, signed treaties mean a better 'climate' for economic growth.
• Treaties are seen as frozen-in-time, yet paradoxically they are guides to the assertion of contemporary land, hunting and fishing 'rights', when everything has ecologically changed for the worst. Thus for example, the Micmacs in the Maritime region of Canada argue that the language in the 1752 Treaty gives them the right to hunt, fish and trap commercially today, anywhere irrespective of season.
• Social environmentalists support the traditional hereditary chief system as opposed to the elected band councils. Traditional indigenous cultures are held up as social and ecological models. While there are many corruptions to the band council system, at least there are elections. There exists a social critique of indigenous peoples and cultural traditionalism - but one would not know it from the social environmentalists. (Metis historian Olive Dickason in her book Canada's First Nations, points out that warfare and hostilities between tribes were endemic throughout the Americas. The Iroquoians practiced cannibalism and torture. Some tribes made human sacrifices. On the Northwest Coast, class divisions were based on wealth, with hereditary chiefs, nobles, commoners, and slaves which could be killed.) A more general critique of the promotion of cultural traditionalism by activists, has been made by Saral Sarkar. He was born in India, now lives in Germany, and is an eco-socialist and feminist advocate, and author of the two-volume Green-Alternative Politics in West Germany. Sarkar points out how many writers "need a romanticized view of the traditional cultures in order to be able to criticize the dominant development model."
• Social environmentalists will not oppose aboriginals commercially hunting, fishing and trapping in provincial and federal parks, wildlife refuges and other protected areas. Most aboriginals retain a human-centered "use" orientation towards wildlife. Peter Usher is a socialist and prominent Canadian indigenous advocate and research director for the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada. He argues that native northerners, "have to have property and management rights in wildlife" and equates this communal right with serving "the interests of conservation." The human-centeredness of Usher's communal views are not questioned but are put forth as superior to either private or state property rights. Left biocentrists would say that it can be argued, that in the past animism provided a buffering or mitigating context for such a human-use orientation towards wildlife. But this is not the situation today under the impact of industrial culture and modern destructive killing technologies. By their practice, as well as giving support to the fur industry and use of the leg-hold trap, commercial hunting by natives of polar bears, walrus, seals and soon to be grey whales, etc. social environmentalists are in head-on opposition to the vitally important animal rights component of the environmental movement. Also, social environmentalists, because of endorsing the wise (?) use of wildlife everywhere due to their view of all species as "resources", go against the general vision outlined in The Wildlands Project: Plotting A North American Wilderness Recovery Strategy, of human leave-alone protected core areas.
• An acceptance without public questioning of aboriginal claims, statements and demands and that natives define the terms of reference of any alliance with environmentalists.
• An acceptance that only aboriginals can define the appropriate use of land in aboriginal areas.
• An acceptance of the existing industrial system through support for 'sustainable development' or 'integrated resource management', provided aboriginals are partners with governments and industry.
• Often uncritically promoting a particular faction within a native community which has itself sought out contact with non-native environmentalists, thereby ignoring significant differences regarding social justice and ecological understanding within the native community.

Moving Forward: Beyond Social Environmentalism

Past treaties were essentially dictated to aboriginals by a feudal-colonial state in Canada - "we have the guns here is the paper for you to sign" - for dispossession of lands, sweetened by some limited monetary and non-monetary benefits. How can such treaties be somehow models for contemporary land use and redress of grievances? It is not a question of past treaty rights but of social and ecological justice today in the 90's. (Since 1973, ten comprehensive land claims have been settled in Canada covering large land areas, such as the Nunavut Lands Claims Agreement of 1993.) It is necessary to go beyond human-centeredness, beyond treaties, and beyond land ownership and property rights. Native self-government must accept present day ecological and social imperatives, and discard the haggling over 18th century treaty rights. Non-native Canadians must accept the imperative of equality. New biocentric and anti-capitalist cultures are needed, grounded in respect for the Earth and social justice.

Where Are We Going?

I am a bioregionalist at heart. Yet at present, the "nation" of Canada, my adopted country, is in a political and constitutional crisis of self-identity and could break apart, making absorption by the United States a real possibility. The existing federal arrangements in Canada do not satisfy the aboriginal peoples, the majority of francophones living in Quebec, or English-speaking Canadians. Therefore major changes are necessary. The results of the 1995 Quebec referendum, where the "sovereigntists" were barely defeated, is one illustration of the fragility of the Canadian nation. Given this general picture, I cannot support any "sovereignty" thrust by aboriginals or francophones, where representatives of either group define themselves as not being citizens of Canada.

Philip Resnick in his important 1994 book Thinking English Canada, points out that we cannot settle aboriginal land claims without having an overall general vision of what Canada should be like. One sees little awareness of this among non-natives in the environmental movement. Resnick says that sovereignty for aboriginals, or the people of Quebec, cannot mean nationhood or forming a state. We must recognize largely self-governing aboriginal nations, not aboriginal nation states. Resnick discusses from a social justice perspective, what a future Canada would possibly look like and the inevitable trade-offs for aboriginal and non-aboriginal Canadians that will be necessary. The areas of jurisdiction that English Canada, Quebec, and aboriginals might want to share would, I think, include foreign policy, defence, trade, currency, citizenship, and quite possibly the environment.

Conclusion

All of us need to become much more conscious of what we want, in order to develop strong social justice and ecocentric alliances between natives and non-natives. This paper, although a critique of social environmentalism, is meant as a contribution towards this. Our common enemy is industrial society. Our common struggles are against social injustice and environmental destruction. Biocentric environmentalists whether non-native or native, must openly stand against further development in Canada. A larger de-industrialization strategy is needed for global ecological survival. Social justice for native peoples within Canada does not demand more development, however this concept is qualified, with its capitalistic assumptions of trickle-down economics. Social justice requires, within Canada and internationally, the redistribution of economic wealth, not further economic growth, and a frugal lifestyle by all, with minimal impact upon the Earth. It is important to see that deep ecology builds on but moves beyond the deep stewardship yet human-centeredness of traditional indigenous thought.

We all have to accept past aboriginal lessons of living simply, such as in the Sahlins' quotation from Stone Age Economics, about "desiring little" which introduces this article. Bourgeois economics promotes and rests on desiring much. The capitalist economic model in its fundamental assumptions is anti-Earth. It must be replaced and openly opposed. We need fundamental rethinking and revolutionary change not social environmentalism. All of us have to move on to an ecocentric ethics.

June 1996