Environmentalism: Policing Itself

This post includes another extract from Peter Dauvergne's Environmentalism of the Rich

The environmental movement has been self-policed from within it's own ranks, undermining it's overall effectiveness.

I would like to discuss two ways this has been happening, although I'm sure there are more. The fragmentary and dynamic nature of the environmental movement have different groups bickering and undermining each other for a number of reasons. I think it would be a mistake to think that I've discovered them all.

The two methods of self-policing I would like to discuss are:

1. Different factions criticising each other for being either too extreme or for not doing enough

2. People from within the ranks of environmentalism being actively bribed and funded by powerful financial interests to sow distrust and turn members of environmental movements against their own people

First, I would like to visit Peter Dauvergne's 'Environmentalism of the Rich'.

Then I would like to refer to an anecdote I heard only recently from a close friend. Let's call him Barry, although that is not his real name (I know him well enough to know without asking that he'd prefer to remain anonymous).

But first, to Peter Dauvergne's 'Environmentalism of the Rich'...

Internal Bickering, State and Corporate Infiltration, Suppression, and Appropriation of Environmental Discourse

“Since the 1990's the moderating tendencies within rainforest activism [have] caused...great distress. Like most global causes these moderating tendencies have become stronger since then, while the fate of those who continue to campaign against injustice remain grim.

Hundreds of rainforest activists and indigenous leaders...have been murdered or have “disappeared” over the last two decades...animal rights activists and more confrontational groups are increasingly being sidelined, facing derision and charges of “eco-terrorism,” not only from the mainstream media, business associations, and state security agencies, but also from within the environmental movement itself...

...Activist groups that reject or challenge the politics and outcomes of environmentalism of the rich face a whole host of risks, from being labelled “unrealistic” and “naïve” to being treated as subversives.

Meanwhile, as the recent history of WWF shows, embracing the discourses of sustainable development, eco-business, stakeholder partnerships, and eco-consumerism opens up many opportunities for NGO's to access new resources, money, and corridors of power.

In this context many NGOs are turning to “cause marketing,” (tagging the purchase of a product to fundraising) and the cobranding of commercial goods to pay for staff and programs. They are partnering with business to set up eco-labeling and eco-certification organisations, such as the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil and the Roundtable on Responsible Soy.

And they are turning to consumers as sources and forces of change, urging them to be “consumer activists” and purchase more products to save the planet...

...As the environmental movement increasingly comes to embrace capitalism and consumerism as solutions (rather than as causes) of unsustainability, states and multinational business are progressively capturing ecological discourses and subsuming environmental networks, deploying the language of sustainability to obfuscate, and in some instances even promote, unsustainable and inequitable consumption.

The end result is to reinforce the belief in the value of national economic growth, technological diffusion, and the globalisation of trade, markets, and investment. Privatisation, deregulation, and liberalisation end up depicted as valuable for sustainability, said to promote the economic growth so necessarily to implement environmental regulations and maintain political stability.

State and corporate discourses further reassure people that modest policy reforms will suffice to produce sustainability, while still allowing consumption (and thus revenues and profits) to continue to rise.

At the same time, the discourses of environmentalism of the rich are reinforcing a belief among well-off consumers in the value of small lifestyle changes and eco-product purchases – again, even in the face of an escalating crisis. Such efforts are now a defining feature of environmentalism in wealthy countries. Consumers are being urged to buy green detergents and order sustainably produced seafood in restaurants. And they're being advised to unplug appliances, shut off dripping taps, and air-dry clothes. Although laudable as individual acts, such efforts do not get at the patterns of extraction, production, and consumption that are causing global unsustainability. Recycling a Starbucks cup or a Coke bottle does nothing to address the subjugation and marginalisation of the worlds least-protected peoples and most vulnerable ecosystems. Nor are sustainable development policies, eco-business initiatives, NGO-business partnerships, and voluntary market-based mechanisms doing much here. At best these manifestations of environmentalism of the rich reduce some of the local symptoms of unsustainability, but do not get at the causes that are spreading like a common cold as the world economy globalises.”

~Peter Dauvergne, 'Environmentalism of the Rich' (p. 13-15)

Infiltration and Bribery: Up-Close

I'd like now to turn to a story I heard only a few days ago, form a friend of mine who was involved in activist group many years ago, during the height of forestry activism in Tasmania. It brought to mind an experience I had with a forestry activist group a few years earlier, and helped explain some of the treatment I got there.

After coming home from living in Melbourne (where I learned I am NOT a city person!), I came home and spent a little time with some of the activist camps around the state. I guess I started to see the true value of what we had, and wanted to help fight for it.

But I wasn't really welcome.

I had a bunch of ideas which I thought could really help the movement, mostly ways of trying to convince people who weren't “the activist type” to consider some of the things we had to say.

One idea I had was called “Suits in Boots”. The idea was meant to shake the idea that you had to look, dress or behave a certain way to have concern over the Tasmanian wilderness. I got the idea from thinking about another organisation “Doctors for Forests”.

The idea of “Suits in Boots” was to have a bus run from town during peoples lunch breaks. To organise with as many organisations that were willing to have an extended, two hour lunch break on whatever day suited the organisation, whether it be a government department or a private organisation, and to bus these people to the forest for a short photo shoot. I thought that perhaps we could have a set of green boots made from some sustainable material such as hemp or recycled plastic, and get the people to come dressed as they would for work, put on the boots and have a publicity shot in the forest, to make a collection of publicity shots of different people from all different walks of life showing their support for the Tasmanian wilderness.

I was pretty young back then, and I couldn't understand why I encountered such resistance to ideas like this. I had a few, but I found that trying to talk about them often left me feeling ostracised.

After hearing my friend Barry talk about his experience, I think I now know why they didn't seem to trust me.

Barry too, was a creative thinker, and came up with some very smart ideas.

One of his ideas was to get all the activists dressed as forestry workers, making them virtually undetectable from the workers that were supposed to be on site. According to him, they managed to get through a fair bit of the day walking around a restricted forestry work area undetected before they were finally caught out.

But then he was approached by the logging interests (I'm unsure if it was Forestry Tasmania, the so-called government regulator or Gunns Ltd itself, the main forestry company at the time) and given an offer.

According to Barry, he was singled out as an intelligent organiser and offered quite a large amount of money to come into their employ as an infiltrator, to give names and descriptions of the people involved.

But they underestimated him. He told them they didn't, in his own words, “have any idea of what the word 'loyalty' means.” One of the reasons I respect the man so much.

Hearing that story made me realise that this had happened - probably more than once – before I had shown up on the scene. I can see now why the group had become so insular and resistant to intelligent people with bright ideas. It more than likely just made them suspicious of me right from the word go.

So I guess you could say, even without the ability to convert people like Barry or myself, the tactic was still working. It had activists afraid of each other, and of the very ideas that could make their campaign more successful. It made them much more inclined to follow “purists” who in a lot of cases used tactics that alienated others more than it changed hearts and minds.

I eventually gave up trying to participate myself. By the time I tried to contribute, the damage had already been done. It just took me a bit of age, maturity and experience to understand why.