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Process

Activism

In this section we will consider not the idiosyncratic motivations and spiritual aspirations of individuals in the environmental movement but the place of several leading environmentalist organizations in the formation of public policy in Canada. Today, the environmental movement draws its support from across the political spectrum, cutting across traditional ideological (left-right) lines. It is currently estimated that there are 12,000 environmental groups operating in the United States. Of the more than 75,000 registered charities in Canada, over 3,000 are devoted to environmental issues of one sort or another.¹⁰⁹ The core activities of these groups range from public education, to advocacy and lobbying, to more radical acts of civil disobedience and "eco-terrorism." Leaving aside the straightforward criminality of tree-spikers and sabotage artists—who presumably do not enjoy charitable status—most environmentalist groups are a combination of a conventional pressure group and what social scientists call a "new social movement."¹¹⁰ In consequence, there is a tendency for many of these groups to practice a kind of dual politics, "mixing the pressure group's pragmatism with the social movement's commitment to the goals of social transformation."¹¹¹ When groups pursue objectives of large-scale social, political, and economic transformation, the result is often a policy position where compromise, conciliation, and the conventional operations of brokerage politics are difficult to undertake. One way of dealing with this difficulty is to move from a position of external opposition to one of internal transformation. Many pressure groups, including environmentalists, have realized the benefits of setting an agenda from inside the tent, as distinct from agitating for change from the outside. The activities and actions of environmentalists read like a case study in regulatory capture undertaken not by an industry, but by a social movement.

The environmentalist network

World Wildlife Federation Canada President Monte Hummel has provided personal insight regarding his education in the realities of environmental politics. Co-founder of the radical Pollution Probe in 1969,¹¹² over the years he has come to recognize the importance of establishment connections and tactics. Speaking about his stint as a professor of environmental studies at the University of Toronto, he remarked, "I was spinning students out into the system. They were becoming executive assistants to ministers and I was building a tremendous network of people… and I realized that we had an opportunity to parachute some of our people into problem areas, whether it was political or corporate."¹¹³ Today, WWF Canada is a multi-million dollar venture employing 57 salaried professionals, considered by one sympathetic observer to be "the ultimate class act of the conservation establishment."¹¹⁴ In the 1998-99 fiscal year, over $1.8 million dollars of their revenue (15.2 percent of their total) came from government: $1,798,377 comes from the federal government, $56,964 from the provinces. Of these revenues, 27.4 percent goes to research and grants, 23.1 percent to conservation awareness, 0.4 percent to lobbying efforts, 63.4 percent to program implementation, and 11.6 percent to fundraising and other administrative activities.¹¹⁵

Of the other environmental groups devoted to the advocacy of preservation of wilderness in Canada, the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society is probably the most prominent. Claiming 13,000 members throughout 10 branches across the country, they are well positioned at the local as well as at the national level. CPAWS devotes its energies to four areas: new park establishment, park integrity ("focused on improving the management of existing wilderness parks to better protect ecological integrity"), natural connections ("focused on linking protected areas with functional habitat corridors such as Yellowstone to Yukon, and Algonquin to Adirondack") and legislative policy reform. These focal areas effectively mirror the policy agenda of the federal government for the national parks. Proposed changes to the legislation on national parks, for example, would fast-track the establishment of new national parks, and strengthen ecological integrity as the interpretive foundation by which new and existing activities would be measured. Likewise, the final report of the Panel on Ecological Integrity cited the importance of bioregional planning, strongly supported by CPAWS.

The long history of effective symbiosis between government and environmental activists was explicitly acknowledged on the occasion of the release of the Report of the Panel on Ecological Integrity, when the federal Heritage Minister prefaced her speech with a special mention of CPAWS founder Gavin Henderson. As a matter of course, the organization has also benefited from significant government funding over the years.¹¹⁶ Ottawa also grants money for CPAWS and its members and supporters to undertake specific projects. Again as a matter of course, CPAWS receives significant funding from granting organizations such as WWF Canada and other private foundations.¹¹⁷

CPAWS does not limit its advocacy to targeted research, straightforward lobbying, and public relations. Given the new access to the judicial system afforded by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and a general growth in the litigiousness of Canadians, it is no surprise that increasingly in recent years, CPAWS has pursued its objectives in the courts.¹¹⁸ In the fall 1998 CPAWS newsletter, the president (David Thomson) and executive director (Mary Granskou) noted: "Never in CPAWS' history have we fielded so many lawsuits, and we see no end in sight." This litigation is significantly aided by the financial and legal expertise provided by the Sierra Legal Defence Fund (SLDF) of California. The SLDF was established in Canada in December 1990 to provide free legal services to Canadian conservationists. Besides advancing strategic litigation, the SLDF coordinates cooperative efforts between environmental groups, provides strategic counsel to grassroots organizations, and prepares scientific analysis and research.¹¹⁹ The organi- zation also champions its "strong and credible presence in the development of effective environmental laws," which is to say that SLDF obliges governments by providing them with draft legislation. Funded through a combination of public donations and foundation grants, the Fund generated revenues of just under $3 million in 1999.¹²⁰ While separate from the Sierra Club of Canada (SCC), SLDF maintains affiliations with both SCC and its American sister organization, Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund (formerly the American Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund). The Sierra Club of Canada Foundation, benefiting from the charitable tax status that is denied the Club and Legal Defence Fund because of their political activities, was given a $10,000 grant in 1999, courtesy of the federal government.¹²¹

The appointment of the SLDF as legal advisor to the Panel on Ecological Integrity is a clear indication that it has become a powerful presence in the Canadian environmental policy sector. A brief survey of some of the past cases that have involved the SLDF in issues arising from litigation in the Banff area indicates that it acts for a wide range of clients, all of whom oppose the traditional multiple-use policy for the national parks. Besides serving as legal advisor to the EI Panel on the future of Canada's parks, the SLDF assisted the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, Alberta Wilderness Society, Bear Society, Bow Valley Naturalists, and Jasper Environmental Society. The SLDF and its clients brought legal challenges to a wide array of economic activities, from the Cheviot mine east of Jasper Park, to the proposed Lake Louise convention centre, and river rafting on the Bow. The EI Panel Report reflected the opinion of the SLDF that Canada's environmental assessment regulations were inadequate: the success of environmental assessments was, to the EI Panel, prima facie evidence that they were too weak.¹²² The Canadian Environmental Assessment Act is now up for five-year review.

Regional activists

At the regional level, the Alberta Wilderness Association is one of the province's oldest conservation groups. Founded in 1965, it bills itself as a "frontline advocacy organization." Of its more than $300,000 in revenue generated in 1998-99, almost 15 percent comes from government funding (the provincial government granted them $6,900). AWA employs six salaried professionals.¹²³ Other regional groups, such as the Bow Valley Naturalists (annual revenue around $16,000) are less bureaucratic, but still useful allies and collaborators on campaigns and petitions to reduce and end development in the Banff Bow Valley Area.¹²⁴

The Eastern Slopes Grizzly Bear Project (ESGBP) warrants a unique mention in any consideration of a support structure for environmental activists in the Banff area. While the annual budget for the ESGBP in 1994-1996 has been around $350,000 per year, over that same time they managed to raise over $1,100,000 for their cause. These funds came from Canadian taxpayers through Parks Canada (46%), the oil and gas industry (34%), the Alberta Government (11%), other research grants (4%), the forest industry (3%), conservation groups (1%), and land development industry.¹²⁵ Despite the fact that over half of their funding comes from government and that many of their key people are present or former Parks Canada employees also on the government payroll, the ESGBP attributes much of its success in influencing public policy, to "providing messages as experts outside of government" since "no matter what the credentials, government employees lack the necessary credibility."¹²⁶ The pose of independent expertise certainly makes for successful public relations, but the real clout comes from having ESGBP people directly involved in developing park policy. "The Parks Canada's Representative on the Steering Committee [of the ESGBP, Jillian Roulet], ultimately became the main author of the park management plan."¹²⁷ The strategy is clear: keep the ESGBP, as an organization, independent of Parks Canada, but ensure that government officials are represented on the key decision-making committees of the "independent" organizations. It is an effective recipe to ensure that "credible," which is to say, ESGBP, policy becomes integrated with "the park management plan."

The fact that environmental interest groups have been successful in getting their policy preferences recognized by government actors is not in itself surprising. All federal and provincial environment ministers routinely consult with leaders of environmental groups, especially with the powerful "Group of 8" contingent, of which the WWF and CPAWS are a part.¹²⁸ In exchange for this access, the groups help with things such as the legitimization of departmental officials and the provision of expert support in bureaucratic turf wars.¹²⁹ Thus, governments and their ministries are both actors and targets in debates over public policy. In one sense this is just politics as usual; in addition, however, the rigid set of assumptions that environmental activists bring to the table means that, to the extent they are successful, the effective menu of policy options is constricted.

Interests of state?

The analysis of the relationship between government and advocacy, interest, or pressure groups has long been a staple of political science in Canada. In the past decade or so, with concern for what has come to be called the "embedded state," analysts have increasingly highlighted the paradoxical character of this relationship. One would expect that interest and advocacy groups would directly seek out targets in the government and provide them with information and policy suggestions or seek indirectly to influence government policy by influencing public opinion to which government policy is presumed to respond.

In fact, however, matters are seldom so simple. In a path-breaking study, Interests of State, Leslie Pal showed how, in response to the national unity "crisis" in the 1960s, the Citizenship Branch of the Secretary of State initiated a "social animation" program that would provide financial support to particular advocacy groups.¹³⁰ Intended to further a progressive policy agenda and advance the spirit of participatory democracy, those targeted to receive this special funding were multicultural, official language minority, and feminist groups. This program channelled public funds into private lobbying efforts in support of government-sponsored initiatives such as official bilingualism and more liberal social policy.

Government funding of interest groups

A similar dynamic appears to be supporting the goals and agenda of the environmental movement. One important indicator of government support for advocacy programs is the amount of funding interest groups and their projects receive. Until 1986, the Department of the Environment relied on ad hoc requests for money on a project-by-project basis; only after criticism from the Auditor General was its grants system reorganized into specific categories. The Class Grants Fund, which provided sustaining grants to environmental non-governmental organizations (ENGOs), received 65 applications in its first year of operation; within a year this number jumped to 500.¹³¹ Other grants were distributed under the Canadian Environmental Network Coalition, an umbrella organization made up of over 1,500 Canadian environmental groups. It provided a core/sustaining grant of $250,000.¹³²

One of the latest government funding vehicles for environmentalists is the EcoAction Community Funding Program. Launched in September 1995 as "Action 21," the federal Environment Minister identified the program as the vehicle by which the Liberal government would redeem its promise of environmental action as outlined in the party's Red Book. Ten million dollars would be set aside annually to support interest groups and projects.¹³³ Like the "social animation" funds of the Secretary of State citizenship programs before them, significant amounts of money were directed to advocacy groups through Action 21 and associated "community animation" grants. The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society has been a frequent recipient of the grants, as has been the Alberta Wilderness Association and the Federation of Alberta Naturalists. Recent examples in the Banff area include $8,500 to CPAWS for its "Bow Valley Area Public Involvement Campaign," to sponsor a public awareness campaign (including a video and brochure) on the importance of preventing any further economic development in the Bow Valley corridor. Likewise they provided $35,000 to AWA, CPAWS and the Federation of Alberta Naturalists for their "Albertans for Wild Places Campaign," the purpose of which is to assist local individuals and organizations in planning, recruitment and advocacy skills; an additional $31,500 went to CPAWS to take its project on the preservation of ecosystems and biodiversity to into the schools, and a further $30,220 went to a program on biology conservation sponsored by the Friends of K-Country and CPAWS.¹³⁴

Pal's study showed clearly enough that the results of government-sponsored "community animation" programs are usually highly questionable. There may well be a community of interest between certain Parks Canada officials and members of "animated" advocacy groups. At the same time, however, when the service that Parks Canada is supposed to provide to all Canadians is directed from Ottawa in support of one group of local interests at the expense of other local interests, tensions can run high. The result, in the example of Banff, has been little short of a public relations disaster both for the Minister and increasingly for the department as well.

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