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Environmental Non-Government Organizations:
A Diversity of Approaches Updated
Myles Kitagawa
Toxics Watch Society Synergy Alberta Conference 2011
October 25
Introduction • Associate Director of the Toxics Watch Society
o Toxic Round Ups o Air quality policy o Regulatory Intervenor
• Edmonton Car Sharing Cooperative • Alberta Environmental Network • Multi-stakeholder advisory forums • Not a sociologist
Overview • Alberta's Environmental Groups (ENGOs) • 3 Scary Ideas • Typology • The Changing Landscape • Events since Synergy 2010 • Questions/Discussion
By the Numbers • AEN 76 members • At least 2 other networks of ENGOS
o Federation of Alberta Naturalists o Alberta Stewardship Network
• Big Green – WWF, Greenpeace, Sierra Club • About 300 environmentalist groups in AB
o Many 'informal' o Varying in composition and definition
An ENGO is in the Eye of ... There are many lesser movement centralizers. ...Synergy Alberta is small start-up network of ENGOs, local authorities, and industry reps. William Walter Kay http://www.ecofascism.com/article21.html
3 Scary Ideas • Nature is unravelling • Our economy is increasingly disconnected from
actual productivity • Our infrastructure assumes a perpetual supply of
cheap fossil fuels
Nature is Unravelling • 2010 Year of Biodiversity
o 30% of Earth's species at risk of extinction • Disrupting nature we use • Direct and indirect human causes
Habitat destruction 2x, 3x, ?x carbon dioxide concentrations
• 2008 Honolulu Declaration of Ocean Acidification o 1st ecosystem collapse marine, not terrestrial
Growth of Non-productive Economy • Excessive financialization of the economy • Productive profit vs speculative profit
You cannot permanently pit an absurd human convention,
such as the spontaneous increment of debt [compound interest] against the natural law of the spontaneous decrement of wealth [entropy].
Frederick Soddy, 1926 Nobel Laureate
We Need Cheap Oil! • Globalization
o Necessities come from somewhere else • Suburban/sprawl
ENGO Typology • Objective • Primary mode of operating • Brief history • Observations
ENGO Typology • Policy Wonks • NIMBYs • BINGOs • ?
Policy Wonk • Objective
o Incremental improvements in environmental performance
o Better business as usual • Primary mode of operating
o Technical policy negotiations
Policy Wonk • Brief history
o Longest history in Alberta / deepest roots o Mode driven by: Political stability (PC since '71) institutional response to emerging issues Canada's First Department of Environment Multi-stakeholder fora
Policy Negotiating ENGOS
Administrative Branch of Government
NIMBYs • Objective
o To protect the quality of a specific geographic place o Mind your own business
• Primary mode of operating o Protest
• Brief History o Ephemeral organizations, react to specific threats o Disband when threat resolves
Policy Negotiating ENGOS
Legislative Branch of Government
BINGOs • Objective
o Social change (attitudes of large populations) o Change the whole business
• Primary mode of operating o campaigns
Legislative Branch of Government
Big International NGOs
Changing Landscape - 2011 • Rapid uptake of Transition Initiatives; "Localization
Movement" • Financialization impacts now felt on "Main Street"
o eclipsing & combining effect on campaigners • "Hollowing-out" the ENGO pool
Transition Town Movement • A world-wide network of communities • Responding to the 3 big fears • On the ground initiatives
o Renewable energy/energy conservation o Food security o Community structural and economic development
Transition Town Movement What we are convinced of is this: • If we wait for the governments, it'll be too little, too late • If we act as individuals, it'll be too little • But if we act as communities, it might be just enough, just
in time.
Transition Town Movement • The environmental movement turned inside-out
o Addresses the 3 big fears by putting people first o Not about saving some outside 'environment' o Don't call them 'environmentalists'
Transition Initiatives • Grow Forward Grovenor, Parkallen Diggers • Operation Fruit Rescue Edmonton • EFCL Green Challenge
• Localization • Permaculture • Social cohesion and resilience • The Positive expression of NIMBY
The Changing Landscape
The Changing Landscape
The Changing Landscape
Anti-financialization protests
Anti-financialization protests
Movement vs Stakeholders • no growth in the "traditional" ENGO community • seen as "1970's environmentalism"
• Federal science and policy capacity cuts
o 700 jobs Environment Canada o 43% cut to CEAA o stratospheric ozone monitoring o Canadian Environmental Network
The Changing Landscape
Questions?