Landscape Planning, 6 (1979) 109-126 o Elsevier Scientific Publishing Company, Amsterdam - Printed in The Netherlands

109

TOWARD A SYNTHESIS OF MOUNTAINS, PEOPLE, AND INSTITU- TIONS

ALAN CHAMBERS

Institute of Animal Resource Ecology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver (Canada)

(Accepted 28 February 1979)

ABSTRACT

Chambers, A., 1979. Toward a synthesis of mountains, people, and institutions. Land- scape Plann., 6: 109. -126.

No matter how well we understand the landscape, and the biophysical forces which shape it, we run into problems. Some of these problems appear to be ecological - the decimation of fish populations by logging, agriculture, or industrial wastes. Others seem to be socio-economic - alienated, disenfranchised, low income hinterland residents. After becoming involved in two “environmental” issues on behalf of political decision makers, the author concludes that these problems, both ecological and socio-economic, are really problems in human behaviour that are closely linked to a serious dichotomy between the structure of natural systems and the structure of our society.

INTRODUCTION

Within the past 5 years, I have had the opportunity to act as mediator in two environmental issues that confronted two successive governments of British Columbia. The first emerged in the mountainous southeastern or Kootenay region of the province and involved dispute between recreation and logging interests (Chambers, 1974). The second surfaced on the rolling woodlands of the Chilcotin plateau. It involved a disagreement between log- ging interests and aboriginal life-styles. I “solved” neither problem. I did, however, gain some insight into environmental problems that I would like to share with you.

That the two incidents emerged in distinctly different landscapes of Brit- ish Columbia is significant, for while the ecological dimensions of the prob- lems vary, other properties are similar. It is in these similarities, rather than the differences, that cause and effect relationships may be found, if indeed they exist at all. While it is tempting to describe the biophysical landscapes in which these issues took place, and the ecological processes involved, the exercise would be academically titillating at best.

Like many environmental issues, both incidents involved overt confronta-

110

tion between groups with a vested interest in particular values. A public meeting in which opposing views of personnel from separate government agencies were exposed and exploited was accurately described in the press as a bitter dispute between recreation and logging interests. The second contro- versy became visible when members of two bands of native Indians camped in front of a bulldozer to prevent the construction of a logging road. Again, the dispute was picked up by the press. Because constituencies which cham- pion logging, or recreation, or aboriginal rights are substantial, because these groups had been aroused, and because decision makers are accountable to the public in general elections held every 3 or 4 years, a summarial response was not enough. Both demanded a visible attempt to resolve the conflicts. In both cases, the Provincial Government sought to mediate the disput.e.

Public debate surrounding both issues was focussed initially on their biophysical dimensions. These were subsequently linked to the social and economic ramifications of the demands of the embattled interests. Can tim- ber values be harvested without unduly compromising fishery and wildlife values? If the latter are compromised to protect the livelihood of those employed in the forest industry, what consequences, monetary and other, will accrue to recreationists, the tourist industry or to native people who depend to some extent at least on fish and game? If timber values are compro- mised to accomodate other interests, what will be the effect on employment, and taxes derived from lumber and pulp mills in the area? This set of ques- tions can be extended to include those asked in environmental disputes everywhere. It represents, in microcosm, the environmental, social, and economic impact statement syndrome in which we have become entangled. The one difference, perhaps, is that the disputes dealt with here demanded early decision. Long periods of study were a luxury or a delaying tactic, that was not available.

APPROACH

My approach to both disputes was similar in most respects. Terms of reference were established outlining objectives and target dates. Most im- portant, individuals representing the various resource values and interests involved were identified, and a series of workshops or round-table discus- sions proposed as the vehicle which we would employ to substantiate the issues and seek compromise positions. Because the problems were initially defined in biophysical terms, these workshops were designed to gather, then synthesize inventories of the variety of resource values available. We were to use both “hard” and “soft” inventories; those which were quantitatively and qualitatively published in tables, maps, and mathematical models of various stripes, and those intuitive, unpublished details derived from the substantial experience of workshop participants.

The immediate objective of the workshops was to facilitate a truly frank and open dialogue between vested interests. Because systems analysis and

111

simulation modelling has proven useful in similar, if academic, circumstances (Holling and Chambers, 1970; Chambers, 1973), I seriously considered using them here. It took less than an instant to learn that honest dialogue requires the stripping away of disciplinary jargon; the expression of every idea in lan- guage that all workshop participants can understand. Substituting one un- familiar language for another results in uniform confusion, rather than uni- form understanding.

In our attempt to resolve the first dispute, 22 resource managers from 12 branches of provincial agencies were identified as workshop participants. That 12 distinct branches of the government service should have to become involved in the settlement of a single dispute seemed incredible, particularly when I learned that many of the individuals involved were strangers to each other. My role was to chair the discussions and maintain contact with in- dustry, recreation groups and other vested interests by meeting with these groups on request. There were in addition, two widely advertised public meetings designed to hear the concerns of the general population.

The second dispute, that which involved conflict between logging interests and native Indians, required an extension of the above format. That is, in addition to representatives of the various government agencies, it was neces- sary to involve representatives from the forest industry, Indian community and other hinterland groups (cattlemen, and guides and outfitters) if the problem was to be resolved. In an attempt to secure this participation, a series of initial discussions were held with the Indian bands, the forest in- dustry, and general hinterland population.

The first dispute occupied 3 months of activity including 2-week long synthesis workshops. The second occupied 4 months of negotiations with government agencies, industry and the hinterland population. It failed to reach the synthesis workshop stage because the aboriginal interests refused to participate. Their mistrust of government, industry, and white society in general is so deep that it will take generations, perhaps, to establish the at- mosphere necessary for open discussion.

THE APPARENT PROBLEMS

During the dialogue that did take place in both cases, a large number of specific problems were identified. The following paragraphs outline four of these problems to establish in a brief and simplistic way, their biophysical context.

Subalpine logging (Figs 1 and 2)

Much to the chagrin of recreationists, wildlife and fisheries biologists and many foresters, logging is underway in many subalpine forests above 1500 m. The inventory of standing timber in some of these areas includes extreme- ly valuable stands of spruce (Picea englemannii Parry ex Engelm), suitable

112

Fig. 1. Subalpine forest where logging and recreation values collide.

for veneer and plywood manufacture. Yet the productive capacity of above 1500 m is generally so low that many foresters consider the bar of these stands to be more mining than forestry. The most severe conj emerge the moment other values are considered.

sit ‘ve flit

A decision to harvest a stand of mature subalpine timber, for instar LCC

contains the implicit decision to remove from the area, an apparently in

;es !st 3,s

sig-

Fig. 2. Access is the principle management tool in the alpine landscape.

nificant lichen (Alectoria sarmentosa Ach.) hanging from the branches of those trees. Because that lichen is an important winter food supply of the mountain cariboo (Rangifer tarandus montanus, Seton), the timber harvest threatens the presence of those animals.

The role which upper reaches of streams play in the life of resident fish populations is still uncertain, but initial evidence suggests it may be exceedingly important. During periods of high water, when the force of the run-off can shift even the largest boulders in a streambed, resident populations may be maintained in the less violent headwaters. The effect of logging on the ability of the headwaters to function as a refuge remains moot, but some caution would seem prudent.

Finally, the legacy of easy vehicular access to high elevations that conven- tional truck logging leaves behind can bring a dramatic increase in the amount of recreational activity in alpine areas. Many recreationists feel that this increased activity will destroy the very values that attract them and are, in consequence, vehemently opposed to the continued development of roads to high elevations. The dampening effect of difficult access on the demand for alpine recreation seems at present, to be the only method which resource managers can employ to keep demand within the limits of supply.

Range management (Fig. 3)

One of the most frequently studied resource problems in British Columbia

114

Fig. 3. Rangeland, where wildlife and agricultural interests collide.

involves the use and abuse of rangelands. These grasslands lie at low eleva- tions, in the rainshadow of major mountain systems, where limited soil mois- ture precludes the growth of forests. They function as winter ranges for populations of several species of wild ungulates that migrate to subalpine and alpine areas during the summer. Fire, a frequent natural visitor to these com- munities, kept the forest from intruding in some areas where soil moisture was sufficient to sustain the more xeric tree species, and frequently extended well into the forested landscape. The result was abundant range, and endur- ing populations of animals dependent upon the grasslands during the winter, and longer.

A newcomer to this landscape, European man, introduced domestic cattle which began to compete with native animals for available forage. The dispute between wildlife managers and cattlemen over appropriate allocations of rangeland began. When forest managers began extinguishing fires, thereby growing trees where grass once grew; when the pondage of hydroelectric dams flooded other winter ranges; when roads, railways, and townsites occu- pied still other areas of winter range, competition for the much diminished food supply intensified. With constant or increasing pressure on a diminish- ing supply, the quality of forage deteriorated to the point that cattlemen and wildlife managers alike have become exceedingly concerned for the quality, and quantity of remaining rangeland.

Hydroelectric development (Fig. 4)

The rivers of British Columbia represent an extremely large source of

Fig. 4. Valley bottoms contain much more than hydroelectric potential. Dam under construction in centre foreground has now flooded forest and fishery values in the valley

beyond.

hydroelectric potential. According to the B.C. Energy Commission (1974) net production of electricity in the province in 1973, was close to 4000 MW. The rated capacity of remaining viable damsites then totaled some 30000 MW. Since 1973, a number of these sources have been harnessed, however the remainder represents a significant storehouse of energy free of the pollution and other problems associated with thermal generating facili- ties. The pressure of continually increasing energy demands in an industrial society urge development of all hydroelectric sources of power.

But the valleys of British Columbia contain much more than the river which sculptured them. All support a fishery, and those draining westward provide spawning and rearing habitat for one or more species of Pacific salmon. In the bottom of these glaciated valleys, a happy mix of climatic and biological processes have developed soils much richer than those found in the more severe environment of the mountainsides. The capacity of this bottomland to produce forests, agricultural products, wintering habitat for wildlife, and a home for man is of far greater importance than its relatively small area would suggest. Dams, the conventional tool which engineers employ to harness the hydroelectric potential of a river, destroy the anadro- mous fisheries, inundate forest and farmland, decimate populations of wild animals by flooding their winter homes, and annihilate human settlements.

116

Aboriginal lifestyle (Fig. 5)

Hydroelectric developments are not the only manifestation of industrial society that destroys the livelihood, and often the homes of hinterland people. Although there are few, if any, native Indians in British Columbia that remain untouched, some bands still live in relatively remote, undevel- oped areas of the province. As roads are extended into these areas, two societies are brought closer together. The consequence of this increased contact has been, for the Indian people, an almost debilitating experience. The use of alcohol and drugs increases, prostitution grows, and tension mounts in communities now torn between two cultures. Where there was at least partial dependency on traditional food and the skills for gathering it, new roads lead to greater dependence on welfare cheques. The harvest of fish and game populations by townspeople is heaviest in areas where the new access routes have been built, leaving a much diminished supply for those who have inhabited the area for centuries. The impact on the lifestyle and culture of these original hinterland people is profound, anticipated, and re- sisted with vigour.

As I became more familiar with each issue that was raised, hope that bio- physical and economic analysis would lead to workable solutions faded rap- idly, and my attention was increasingly drawn to the behaviour of the vari- ous actors involved. When discussing the impact of the harvest of one re- source on the production of another, for example, disagreements were sel- dom substantive. Truly, much more can be learned about this interaction, both in the case of mutually exclusive values (hydro or forestry) and in the

Fig. 5. Rolling, unroaded woodland where aboriginal and urban society collide.

117

case of mutually compatible management (forestry and wildlife). What troubled me was that we seldom, if ever, apply the knowledge that we do have. We can, for example, construct a production alternatives curve (Fig. 6) roughly defining the relationship between wood and deer production but such relationships are not employed when developing forest management plans. We also possess forest harvesting technologies (cable logging systems or railways) that minimize road construction, hence the stream sedimenta- tion and legacy of access that impact so profoundly on fish populations, alpine recreation, and native communities; and although it may label me more a lunatic than a resource manager, we are, I believe, sufficiently inven- tive to harness hydroelectric power by means other than dams hundreds of feet high.

WOOD

Fig. 6. Production alternatives curve illustrating the relationship between wood and deer

production.

During many discussions, questions of detail were often raised. Their ef- fect was to delay, or obstruct, rather than to cast new light, or new doubt, on a particular relationship. It became apparent to me that the problems originally defined in biophysical or economic terms had to be redefined in human terms. It is the behaviour of society, not the behaviour of ecosys- tems, that requires adjustment. Indeed, it was the intense political activity of recreation interests that led to a decision in the dispute between recre- ationists and loggers. Decision in the second dispute was based on the reluc- tance of native people to join with lumbering interests to plan development that would accomodate their lifestyle. No amount of biophysical knowledge, no number of sophisticated simulation models would satisfy these essential human features. The solutions must be elsewhere.

118

THE REAL PROBLEMS

If environmental or resource management problems are redefined as prob- lems in human behaviour, our perspective broadens enough that new and unfamiliar approaches to solution appear. Our understanding of the econom- ic and biophysical properties of resource systems remains important, for knowledge is surely one of the agents that conditions our behaviour. But there are other conditioning agents that must now be considered.

Because I am neither psychologist, nor sociologist, anthropologist, or eco- nomist, I tread gingerly into the following paragraphs. But since it is not my intention to launch a philosophical discussion of the nature of man, to decry greed, to promote a new ethic, or to propagate nonsense notions of rational man and perfect competition, I hope territorial hackles will relax sufficient- ly to consider the following thoughts. They rise in the minds of pragmatic resource managers attempting to identify controls that may be manipulated to induce different patterns of human behaviour.

Canada. an urban nation

Canada is one of the most urban, and one of the most rapidly urbanizing countries in the developed world. More than three of every four Canadians now live in urban centres. British Columbia’s population has been urbanized more quickly than that of Canada as a whole (Table I). Between 1951 and 1971, as Canada’s population grew from just over 14 million to almost 22 million, the larger centres have consistently received more people than small- er communities (Table II). The implications of this trend are of central im-

TABLE I

Percent of population urban, Canada and British Columbia, 1871-1971

Year Canada British Columbia

1871 18.3 9.0 1881 23.3 18.3 1891 29.8 42.6 1901 34.9 46.4 1911 41.8 50.9 1921 47.4 50.9 1931 52.5 62.3 1941 55.7 64.0 1951 62.4 68.6 1961 69.7 72.6 1971 76.1 75.7

Source: Statistics Canada, Census Division. “Population by census metropolitan areas” revised July 1973, and Statistics Canada 1971, Census of Canada: Population Census Subdivisions (Historical) Bulletin 1.1-21, Cat. No. 92-702, Ottawa: Information Canada.

119

TABLE II

Growth and distribution of Canada’s population 1951-1971

Year % of population in cities Total

> 100 000 < 100 000 population ___-

1951 45.7 16.7 14 009 429

1961 50.9 18.8 18 238 247

1971 55.1 21.0 21 568 311

Source: Statistics Canada, Census Division. “Population by census metropolitan areas”

revised July 1973, and Statistics Canada 1971, Census of Canada: Population Census Subdivisions (Historical) Bulletin 1.1-21, Cat. no. 92-702, Ottawa: Information Canada.

portance to resource management for an even higher percentage of Canada’s income, decision making power, and financial leverage is concentrated in the metropolitan centres of the country. Yet the economy depends heavily on products of the hinterland - pulp, lumber, minerals, food, fish, and hydro- electric power. This concentration of power in cities, and economic depen- dency on products of the hinterland may be more pronounced in British Columbia than in Canada as a whole, first because the provincial population is crowded into the southwest corner of the province, and secondly, because its economy is tied closely to the forest and mineral industries.

At least three principal consequences of urbanization are central to the rise of environmental problems. The metropolitan appetite for energy and materials is enormous and growing at a rate larger than the rate of popula- tion growth in these centres. The urban-based organizations required to feed this gargantuan appetite are necessarily insensitive, or at least unrespon- sive to symptoms of hinterland malaise, be it social, economic or ecological.

Secondly, control of resources and markets is rapidly flowing from the hands of hinterland businessmen, and into the hands of urban bureaucracies, both public and private. Control of agricultural soils and marketing quotas are being sequestered by agribusiness. Forest harvesting rights are concentra- ted and held by fewer and fewer forestry giants. Even ocean fisheries have now become a private property resource controlled by fewer and fewer licence holders and their bureaucratic, government counterparts. The result is a population of alienated, disenfranchised and bitter hinterland people.

The third important consequence of the urban concentration of people and power is almost the reverse. The “ecofreak” is essentially an urban phenomenon, the result of an incredibly naive view of the natural world, heightened sensitivity to social and ecological malaise and mistrust of the institutions which appear to generate the disease. While many such individ- uals fill the ranks of the environmental protest movements, others migrate to the countryside as urban refugees to find that mother nature is not quite so kind and loving as Walt Disney told them she was. Together these people

120

have conditioned the political environment of elected decision makers to a very significant degree.

While these observations may be considered extreme, they do suggest a number of controls that may be used to adjust the behaviour of government agencies and resource industries. They also suggest controls which may be used to change the political environment in which decision makers must operate. These ideas are briefly introduced in the following discussion.

Institutional strut ture

If we are to manage efficiently in ecological terms, natural systems must be managed as whole systems. Explicit recognition must be given to the variety of products which we may derive from them, as well as to their bio- physical capabilities and limitations. From the socio-economic perspective, the same argument holds. To provide the mix of products which our society demands, whether this demand is expressed in the marketplace or through other avenues, the management group must be free to respond to as wide a variety of these demands as its resource base will allow, rather than to a single component of that demand; and because demand patterns fluctuate, an institution that is able to respond by adjusting its position on a produc- tion possibilities curve is far more viable economically and socially, than one locked to a particular point on that curve.

This line of argument is, of course, not new. It has led in the private sec- tor to large, horizontally integrated firms. Although corporations are able to respond to the variety of demands for fibre products, their view of the nat- ural systems within which they operate is restricted to fibre alone. They are permitted to harvest dollars, if you will, from the production of fibre pro- ducts, but not from fish and wildlife, and/or recreation values. In the public sector, agencies structured to manage single resource values have been gath- ered into departments of environment. But the result has always been a simple reshuffling of the cards. The game remains the same. At best it is covert rivalry. Individual agencies compete for individual parcels of land from which one resource is to be extracted. We have forest reserve and wilderness reserves with no notion that one area could accomodate both sets of values.

The failure of these experiments in the reorganization of resource agencies demonstrates only that the changes have not been great enough to induce new behavioural patterns. The mandates of individual agencies have not changed sufficiently to challenge antique thought patterns, nor has the re- ward system to which individual managers respond. Positions of responsibili- ty, influence, and prestige have become proportionately few in number, and more centrally based with the increasing scale of organizations. But how can institutions be changed so that minds are stimulated, attitudes modified, and resource management groups developed that can, and will respond to the changing demands of society, to the variety of production possibilities

121

which a given ecosystem offers, and to the limitations imposed by that eco- system?

A number of tactical tools, readily available and frequently used by lead- ers everywhere, suggest themselves. One is to move the location of responsi- bility for decision to a point most sensitive to signs of social, economic, and ecological malaise. Another is to adjust patterns of resource tenure, thereby modifying the view or breadth of vision of resource managers and their predisposition to sequester territory. Yet another is to manipulate the tax system, recognizing that it is a tool for adjusting the behaviour of the private sector toward the resource base, as well as a method for raising public money. Yet another is to adjust the lines of communication within and be- tween government agencies, corporations, and the general public. The use of each of these “tools for managing human behaviour” could well form the theme of several volumes. I wish only to offer one or two thoughts concern- ing each.

Perhaps the greatest advance in building functional organizations is to be found in the private or industrial sector of society. In many, although cer- tainly not all large industrial organizations, there has been a visible shift of responsibility to management positions most sensitive to social, economic, or ecological malaise which might threaten productivity, hence the health of the organization. Governments might watch, and learn much. There is a caveat to this observation, however, that is best described by Eddy et al. (1976, p. 23)

“Nations, certainly, would not survive if they could not, at times, provide special moral frames within which ordinarily sane and decent people will cheat, lie, and even kill. ‘If we did for ourselves what we are doing for Italy’, said Count Cavour, ‘what shocking rascals we should be’.”

“Corporations, especially the large and complex ones with which we have to live, now appear to possess some of the qualities of nation states - including, perhaps, an alarming capacity to insulate their members from the moral consequences of their actions. It may be an inevitable tendency: it is nevertheless one that needs to be

watched, understood, and controlled.”

The same caveat applies to large urban-based government organizations which are defined in terms of a discipline, or a single resource value: a parks branch, a forest service, or a fisheries service. Rewards are derived by seques- tering power and influence in the name of a single agency, and a single re- source value. Our experience with departments of environment suggest that the solution is not simply to collect these many agencies within a single ministry, to reshuffle the cards for another hand; instead, we must modify the lines of communication between them, and reallocate responsibility for decision. If these large multidisciplinary organizations are scaled down to a workable size on the basis of geographical region rather than resource disci- pline, and if the management teams that result are led by an individual whose vested interest is to make the planning and management processes function, the game would certainly change. If such a structure did not pro- vide incentives for individual players to work together, at least it would remove some present incentives to play against each other.

122

Tenure

The behaviour of any organization toward the landscape is closely linked to its tenure, or ownership of the resource base. In British Columbia, as in other parts of Canada, one finds a multitude of resource tenure patterns in the private sector. These vary from free simple ownership of the land, in- cluding all resources on and under it, through the most tenuous leasehold of a single resource. In the public sector jurisdiction over the resource base is allocated to government agencies through a system of parks, forest re- serves, and agricultural reserves. The behaviour of government agencies to- ward the territory under their jurisdiction parallels that sometimes found in the private sector, and resembles that of seagulls defending their breeding territories.

Strange as it may seem, very little scholarly or professional literature exists which documents the social, economic, or environmental conse- quences of these diverse tenures. The major sources are a few Royal Com- mission reports, isolated speeches, and obscure government documents. Yet debate over the relative virtues of private or public ownership of the land rages on.

Rather than marshal the litany of arguments that the introduction of this subject conjures, I would like to describe two situations that seem to me to be incompatible with an holistic approach to resource management. One relates to public ownership, the other to corporate tenure.

With reference to the public sector, one finds a Forest Service, Parks Branch, Fish and Wildlife Branch, Lands Branch, Water Resource Service, etc. Each of these agencies is established by an act of the legislature which focusses its attention on a single resource. Some agencies have senior deci- sion making authority, or tenure, on significant areas of public land, others have none. Thus we find a Forest Service whose principal concern is fibre production, making implicit decisions regarding the production of fish and game, and a Fish and Wildlife Branch with no jurisdiction over habitat, hence the production of the resource which it is charged with managing. We find a Hydro and Power Authority with extremely narrow terms of refer- ence, yet an incredible influence on thousands of acres of the most produc- tive land in the province. Still another example is the Parks Branch, again, the senior decision making authority over significant portions of British Columbia, but having very narrow terms of reference.

The effect of this disciplinary taxonomy of resource agencies and tenures is to foster defensive, rather than synergistic or co-operative behaviour so necessary for “integrated” or holistic resource management. The result is not only ecologically inefficient resource management, but suspect economic efficiency and inequitable distribution of the costs and benefits of the values that are derived. In the extreme the agencies in question are restricted from producing more than a single product from ecosystems that are capable of producing much more; and while that single product, may be distributed to

123

one social group (usually urban) the costs of the products forgone are dis- tributed to other, usually hinterland, constituencies. One group gets the electric power, the other is evicted. The tenure system, as it stands, seems designed to create environmental disputes, rather than to avoid them.

With reference to the private sector, as already mentioned, resource in- dustries may derive revenues from a limited number of resources at best. Attention to fish and wildlife or recreation values incurs costs which cannot be recovered other than through the goodwill that such attention generates. In Canada, these other values are generally recognized as public property resources. It would therefore be political folly to allocate fish and game, or extensive recreation values to the private sector under some form of tenure for distribution through the market system. But economic incentives or dis- incentives of various kinds can be used to reorient the attention of resource managers in the private sector.

Taxation

The influence of tax structures on the behaviour of corporations and in- dividuals has certainly been widely studied. I wish only to illustrate, very briefly, the impact which variations in tax policy can have on the landscape, and in the precipitation of “environmental” problems. Although many examples might be used, one in particular deserves attention here; it relates to logging.

After trees are cut, they are brought (yarded) to the side of the road where they can be loaded on trucks. The various methods of yarding in use can be grouped in two classes, those that employ cables, pulleys, and station- ary engines, and those that employ a motor vehicle of some sort to drag the logs to the roadside. Cable systems are much less destructive of forest land than ground vehicles, particularly on steep moist hillsides like those fre- quently found at high elevations. Said another way, cable systems respect the physical and biological properties of mountain forests, the use of ground vehicles does not. But because the latter system is less expensive, it is the most commonly used. It results in severe problems of erosion, or landscape destruction, and of deterioration in the capacity of some mountainsides to produce timber and other values.

While there are a number of methods which the Forest Service might use to ensure the appropriate match of logging technology and biophysical site, tax adjustments are most widely used in British Columbia. Here, there is a rather complex method for determining the stumpage, or direct tax revenue, that the government derives from the sale of wood growing on public land. In highly simplified form, stumpage paid by interior (as opposed to coastal) logging companies equals the value of the lumber produced, less approved costs of logging, manufacturing, forestry, and a predetermined profit margin. Because the Forest Service specifies logging costs, it therefore controls the logging technology applied to a particular site. Until recently, Forest Service

124

policy was to approve cheaper, inappropriate logging technologies in order to increase direct revenue from the sale of wood. The land, along with the public image of the Forest Service and forest industry suffered.

Public communication

Much of the heat generated in the two environmental disputes upon which this essay is based, was generated by public communication patterns that are monologue at best. Nothing seems to anger people more quickly than to be ignored, particularly when they must pay unrecognized costs of a particular development. To advise them by letter, speech, or the approach of a bull- dozer that development is to begin, draws an angry response. Yet this is the rule, rather than the exception, as the arms of urban society reach into the hinterland for fibre, hydroelectric power, and a host of other resources. In- deed, the premise of development agencies and industries seems to be that until their activities harness these resources, they remain unused, or wasted. That premise is false.

With reference to the Indian community mentioned in the introduction, several years of polite requests for dialogue produced the minimum response from the government. The only tactic which remained available to protect their interest was public demonstration that would be picked up by the press. The use of this tactic produced delay, but by the time a partnership in the planning process was offered to them some 4 years later, their mistrust of the legislature had matured to the point that the offer was rejected. They plan instead to file a land claim in the hope that they can wrest control of the land in question away from urban society.

The confrontation between logging and recreation interests in the other “environmental dispute” contains many of the same elements. There, sur- veyors stakes in a drainage previously accessible on foot or horseback alone, announced a 20-year-old decision to log the valley. Recreation interests pressed the government so vigorously that they forced a decision to transfer jurisdiction over the valley from the Forest Service to the Parks Branch.

Both of the above disputes, and the conclusions reached might have been happier for all concerned had public dialogue and serious consultation pre- ceded decisions to “develop” the areas - happier, because in both cases, there was a winner, and a loser. One interest group was forced to absorb costs which, from an ecological perspective, are unnecessary. Most of the interests of all groups involved in both disputes could, from a biophysical perspective, be accommodated.

CONCLUSION

When Liebig articulated his law of the minimum, he set the stage for many of the advances in resource husbandry that we have witnessed over the last 135 years. That law, either explicitly or implicitly, has guided our search

125

for limiting factors, whether they were related to soils, climate, species composition, nutrition, genetics, or a host of additional biological or physi- cal sciences. But the limits which we encounter while trying to solve current problems in resource management are unfamiliar. They seem to be related to human behaviour, rather than to the biophysical sciences. It is the behav- iour of society, rather than the behaviour of ecosystems, that now requires adjustment.

Of the many analogies that might be used to describe this theme, that used by Mowshowitz (1975, p. 237) is among the best.

“Contemporary society may be compared to a rambling edifice that has grown by accretion. Unlike the great cathedrals which inspire our admiration of the virtues of a simpler age, it is singularly deficient in architectural integrity. The edifice has now become problematic because its internal flaws and contradictions are beginning to surface.”

The conventional approach to surfacing problems is invariably based on the notion that each problem is independent of all others, that each failure is caused by some technological flaw. A little mortar, perhaps a larger build- ing block - granite rather than sandstone - is all that is required to restore equilibrium. Subalpine logging, range management, hydroelectric develop- ment, aboriginal lifestyles, or indeed an endless list of similar controversies here and elsewhere are identified as single problems, defined in biophysical or economic terms and subjected to disciplinary analysis.

Based on such narrow approaches, solutions may or may not achieve the specific objective they were designed to reach. More often, they precipitate unanticipated, negative and substantial side effects in other parts of the edi- fice. The effect, for example, of a hydroelectric development, built to satisfy prophesied urban demand for electrical power, may severely erode the strength of a hinterland community and swell the ranks of the urban unem- ployed; and the extraction, from the forest industry, of tax dollars to satisfy some urban demand (feed the unemployed?) can prove to be an ecological, economic, and social nightmare.

A second approach to the underlying problem is more holistic than con- vention allows, in that it recognizes the probability of structural weakness in our society (Illich, 1972; Beer, 1975). It redefines environmental prob- lems in terms of human behaviour, and most important seeks to identify controls which we can manipulate at will. In the context of my experience, four such controls surface immediately. All are closely linked with the urban concentration of people, power, and influence in this country.

The structure of our thinking, and the structure of our institutions is changing (Science Council of Canada, 1973; Thompson and Eddy, 1973). There has, in fact, been an evolutionary development in the edifice that

some would condemn. The great challenge, it seems to me, is to muster the

courage to examine this evolution, to admit mistakes, and to experiment

with bold, unfamiliar modifications. Until we learn to induce synergistic behaviour among resource managers and users, until the defensive posturing

126

of naive environmentalists and the strutting of territorially proud resource agencies is recognized as genuine comedy, any number of new analytical techniques in biology, mathematics or economics, will yield nothing more significant than academic promotion.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Photographs courtesy of the B.C. Department of Travel Industry.

REFERENCES

B.C. Energy Commission, 1974. B.C. Energy Supply and Demand Forecast. B.C. Energy Commission, Victoria, B.C., 341 pp.

Beer, S., 1975. Platform for Change. John Wiley and Sons, London, 457 pp. Chambers, A.D., 1973. Systems approach to resource allocation. In: Essays on Aspects

of Resource Policy. Background Study No. 27. Science Council of Canada, Ottawa, Ont., pp. 37-66.

Chambers, A.D., 1974.. Purcell Study: Integrated Resource Management for British Co- lumbia’s Purcell Mountains. Environment and Land Use Committee, Victoria, B.C., 79 pp.

Eddy, P., Potter, E. and Page, B., 1976. Destination Disaster. Ballatine Books, New York, N.Y., 443 pp.

Holling, C.S. and Chambers, A.D., 1970. Resource science: the nurture of an infant. Bio- Science, 23 (1): 13-30.

Illich, I.D., 1972. Deschooling Society. Harper and Row, New York, N.Y., 136 PP. Mowshowitz, A., 1975. The Conquest of Will. Addison-Wesley, Don Mills, 365 pp. Science Council of Canada, 1973. Natural Resource Policy Issues in Canada. Rep. No. 19,

Ottawa, Ont., 59 pp. Thompson, A.R. and Eddy, H.R., 1973. Jurisdictional problems in natural resource

management in Canada. In: Essays on Aspects of Resource Policy. Background Study No. 27. Science Council of Canada, Ottawa, Ont., pp. 67-96.