Shale gas development and community response: perspectives from Treaty 8 territory,British Columbia

Northeast British Columbia (BC), Canada, is the site of a fast-growing shale gas industry that is a cornerstone of the current provincial government's economic policy. In this paper, we explore the perspectives of local First Nations (members of Treaty 8) regarding governance of this industry, focusing in particular on the experiences of the Fort Nelson First Nation (FNFN). Based on findings from 15 in-depth interviews with staff from four Treaty 8 First Nations, the Treaty 8 Tribal Association, oil and gas companies, and the Government of BC, we argue that current governance processes fail to adequately protect the environment and treaty rights. We also explore the diverse tactics that the FNFN is using to gain influence over shale gas development within its territories as the Nation seeks to achieve “balanced development” that protects the local ecology and treaty rights while maximising local economic benefits. Through an array of tactics and collaboration with diverse actors, the FNFN has been partially successful in challenging industry's social license to operate and has brought the provincial government back to the table to negotiate new decision-making arrangements on a “government to government” basis. Still, the regulation and management of a fast-paced global industry are a vast burden for a small community to bear. The FNFN's work has also shown the need for further research on how local efforts for equitable and environmentally sustainable approaches to shale gas regulation can be scaled up, institutionalised, and used to create political opportunities in other contexts.     

EFFECTS OF CLEARCUTTING AND SLASHBURNING ON STREAM TEMPERATURE IN SOUTHWESTERN BRITISH COLUMBIA1

A paired watershed study was conducted in western hemlock/western redcedar/Douglas fir forests of southwestern British Columbia to assess the effects of clearcutting and clearcutting plus slash-burning treatments on stream water characteristics. In the case of stream temperatures, both treatments increased summer temperatures as well as summer daily temperature fluctuations. These effects lasted for seven years in the case of the clearcut stream but longer in the case of the clearcut and slashburned stream. Clearcutting increased winter stream temperatures whereas slashburning caused a decrease. These changes lasted less than four years. Clearcutting and slashburning had a greater impact on stream temperatures than did clearcutting alone.     

Green jobs for the disadvantaged in British Columbia: the perspectives of non-governmental organisations and social entrepreneurs

This paper examines the actions and potential of green jobs for the disadvantaged, from the perspective of non-governmental organisations and social entrepreneurs. The populations of interest include: low-income, developmentally challenged, those with mental health or addiction issues, women, and First Nations. Findings indicate that green businesses and social entrepreneurs have uniquely engaged in social training and hiring strategies related to green jobs. The major challenges they face include a lack of policies that support the development of green jobs through social training and hiring. As a result of these findings, an argument is made for combining job and life skills for both disadvantaged populations and the agencies that serve them as well as building the capacity of employers to practise social hiring.     

Forestry and environmental democracy: the problematic case of the South Wales Valleys

Academic arguments present a critique of representative democracy and suggest that enhanced participation of communities in the management, governance and regulation of their local environments is required. Similarly, theorists of environmental democracy suggest the possibility and desirability of community involvement. In this paper, we argue that theories of environmental democracy lack the explanatory power to address real-life relations between people and their environment. Drawing on empirical material from recent research in the forested communities of the former coalfields of the South Wales Valleys, we identify significant rigidities, inertia and barriers that stand in the way of community participation in environmental democracy. We do this by constructing a framework for critical analysis that postulates a connection between recent shifts towards post-productivism in British forestry policy and theories of environmental democracy. Our findings point to a dissonance between, on the one hand, post-productivist forestry policy and theoretical discourses of governance, participation and environmental democracy, and, on the other hand, the actual situation of people living in the communities of the Valleys forest in South Wales. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Print Media Framing of the Environmental Movement in a Canadian Forestry Debate

In a recent paper, it was suggested that one of the reasons behind the decline in public regard toward British Columbia's environmental movement was an increasingly negative portrayal of them by the print media. To investigate this suggestion, we undertook a content analysis of print media reporting of forestry and environmental activities in the province's most widely read newspaper, the Vancouver Sun, during 1993 and 1997. We hypothesized that if the print media did contribute to the decline in public regard toward the environmental movement, we would find increasingly negative coverage of the environmental movement over the periods studied. We also hypothesized that this would be accompanied by a decrease in the frequency of articles dealing with issues consistent with the agenda of the environmental movement. We were not able to provide support for our initial hypothesis, nor did we observe a decrease in coverage emphasizing the environmental issues. We did, however, observe an increase in coverage of articles emphasizing typically proindustry issues with many more articles written with a proforestry slant in 1997 than articles written in 1993. This suggests that there had been an agenda shift from environmentally oriented concerns in British Columbia to those associated with the forest industry. As an explanation for the agenda shift, we point to changes in the management and reporting philosophy at the Vancouver Sun, the emergence of an organized, proindustry counterframing strategy by the BC Forest Alliance, and the implementation of several government policies aimed at regulating the activities of the forest industry.     

Book review

Environmental Groups in Politics

Philip Lowe and Jane Goyder

Resource Management Series 6, George Allen & Unwin, 1983.     

Book review

Jan L. Flora is Professor of Agricultural Economics and Sociology at Viriginia Tech, specializing in the areas of community, agricultural, and rural change in the United States and in developing countries. Current research projects include assessing the role of agrarian reform in Latin American development; a study of adequacy of services to small, minority, and female North Carolina farmers; and directing a nationwide study of rural community grassroots development efforts funded by the US Department of Agriculture. He founded and directed the Kansas Center for Rural Initiatives at Kansas State University from 1987 to 1989. He was a member of the Latin Amercian Studies Association Commission on compliance with the Central American Peace Accords in 1988. Jointly with Cornelia Flora, he has studied dominant approaches to international development in the post-World War II ear. They served as Program Advisor for Agriculture and Rural Development for the Ford Foundation in Bogota, Colombia, from 1978 through 1980. At Virginia Tech, he recently served as campus coordinator for the SARSA project, a cooperative agreement with USAID for conducting research in Third World countries in the areas of natural resource management, rural-urban linkages, and women’s roles in these processes.     

Book review

Agriculture, Conservation and Land Use: Law and Policy Issues for Rural Areas

W. Howarth & C. Rodgers (Eds)

Cardiff, University of Wales Press, 1992, xi + 280 pp., £35     

Book review

Books reviewed:
Marian Radetzki (John E. Tilton) The Green Myth — Economic Growth and the Quality of the Environment
Richard Starkey and Richard Welford, eds. (Orland Wilkerson) The Earthscan Reader in Business and Sustainable Development
Edward Goldsmith and Jerry Mander, eds. (Orland Wilkerson) The Case Against the Global Economy and for a Turn Towards Localization
Susan Perkoff Bass and Manuel Ruiz Muller (Traci Warkentin) Protecting Biodiversity: National Laws Regulating Access to Genetic Resources in the Americas
Tanya M. Shenk and Alan B. Franklin, eds. (Philip LeBel) Modeling in Natural Resource Management: Development, Interpretation, and Application
Norman Myers and Jennifer Kent (Suna Bayrakal) Perverse Subsidies: How Tax Dollars Can Undercut the Environment and the Economy     

Book review

David Terkla is a professor in the Economics Department and Environmental Sciences Program at the University of Massachusetts Boston.