IN DEFENCE OF HOME PLACES: ENVIRONMENTAL ACTIVISM IN NOVA SCOTIA, 1970 - 1985 by Mark Richard Leeming Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Dalhousie University Halifax, Nova Scotia August 2013 © Copyright by Mark Richard Leeming, 2013 Table of Contents List of Figures ……………………………………………………………….……..iv Abstract …………………………………………………………………………….v List of Abbreviations Used…………………………………………….……….….. vi Acknowledgements ………………………………………………………………...viii Chapter 1 - Introduction..……………………………………………………….......1 Green History and the World …………………………………………..…..7 A Note on Sources ..……………………………………………………..… 24 Organization ..…………………………………………………………..…. 27 Chapter 2 - At Home and Abroad: the genesis of environmentalism……...……. 34 The Deep Roots of Activism ………...……………………………………. 35 “Calamity Howlers”: Estuarine Environmentalism ..……………….…….. 47 Aspects of a Global Whole ..………………………………………….…. 60 Organization and Reaction ...…………………………………………..….. 74 Conclusion……………… ...…………………………………………..….. 85 Chapter 3 - The Two MECs: anti-nuclear environmentalism…………………….. 87 The Unlikely Battle for Stoddard Island ..…………………………….….. 91 Not in Anybody's Backyard ..……………………………………….…….. 98 Citizen-Science and Political Power ..…………………………….………. 107 1979: “It Can Happen Here” ..……………………………………….……. 122 Conclusion ..………………………………………………………….….... 129 ii Chapter 4 - Power from the People: the anti-chemical campaigns………….….. 133 “Fatal to Children”: Insecticide Spraying in Cape Breton……………….... 137 “The General Public's Over-reaction” ..…………………………………... 142 An Uncertain Relationship with Power………………………………….... 151 The Other Spray ..……………………………………………………….... 156 Playing by the Rules: The Herbicide Trial.……………………………..… 171 The Sting of Defeat………. ..…………………………………………..… 187 Conclusion ..……………………………………………………………..... 195 Chapter 5 - Two Environmentalisms: uranium and radicalism………………...... 198 A Dawning Realization of Risk ..………………………………………..... 201 The Cracks Appear ..…………………………………………………..….. 215 The Royal Commission on Uranium Mining…………………………….... 222 Homeland Defence ..………………………………………………..…...... 229 A Parting of the Ways ..……………………………………………….….. 239 Implosion ..……………………………………………………………..…. 247 Conclusion ..…………………………………………………………..…... 254 Chapter 6 - Watermelons and Market Greens: legacies of early activism............. 258 The Enemy of My Enemy ..………………………………………..……… 259 Ever at Odds ..………………………………………………………..…… 266 Chapter 7 - Conclusion……………………………. ..………………................... 280 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………..… 289 iii List of Figures Figure 1.1…………………………………………………………………. 28 Figure 4.1…………………………………………………………………. 188 Figure 4.2…………………………………………………………………. 194 Figure 5.1…………………………………………………………………. 208 Figure 5.2…………………………………………………………………. 253 iv Abstract This dissertation traces the origins and development of environmental activism in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, from the late 1950s to 1990, with a central focus on the period from 1970 to 1985, during which the structure of the lasting movement took shape. The crucial events or issues that both produced and molded the movement in Nova Scotia are discussed in detail over three chapters of the dissertation. They include a foray into nuclear energy promotion by the provincial government in the 1970s, a set of controversies over chemical biocide use in industrial forestry from 1975 to 1983, and a fight to prevent uranium mining in the early 1980s. Each campaign brought activists closer to recognizing the differences that divided them. The factor that unites the three central controversies and the many others that join them in this dissertation is the ideological content of their history, specifically the progressive divergence of activist organizations inspired by fundamentally different views of the nature of environmental problems and the potential for their solution within the existing modernist industrial society. It is the tensions between the eco-modernist mainstream and the radical minority that account in large part for the successes and failures of activists in the province, as well as for the nature of their interactions with governments, industries, and fellow activists outside of Nova Scotia. Indeed, the relationship of centres and peripheries -- intraCanadian or intraprovincial -- constitutes a vital theme in explaining the origin of environmentalism as well as its fragmentation. This account of Nova Scotian environmental activism addresses the common reality of environmentalism in Canada. As this research suggests, the country's environmentalism can only be understood, in any era, through the lens of its provincial components and through an analysis that relies on ideological difference as much as the material factors of social movement mobilization. v List of Abbreviations Used AECB Atomic Energy Control Board AECL Atomic Energy of Canada Limited APES Association for the Preservation of the Eastern Shore BBPCC Bedford Basin Pollution Control Committee B.t.k Bacillus thuringiensis kurstaki CANDU Canadian Deuterium-Uranium Reactor CAPE Citizen Action to Protect the Environment CARE Citizens Against a Radioactive Environment CAUM Citizens Against Uranium Mining CBLAS Cape Breton Landowners Against the Spray CCCC Concerned Citizens of Cumberland County CCNR Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility CEAC Canadian Environmental Advisory Council CEN Canadian Environmental Network CEPA Chaleur Environmental Protection Association CFS Canadian Forestry Service COPE Communities Organized to Protect the Environment CSG Conserver Society Group DDT Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane DLF Department of Lands and Forests (Nova Scotia) DOA Department of Agriculture (Nova Scotia) DOE Department of Environment (Nova Scotia) EAC Ecology Action Centre ECC Environmental Control Council EMR Energy, Mines, and Resources ENGO Environmental Non-Governmental Organization FACT Fundy Area Concern for Tomorrow FOE Friends of the Earth (Canada) FON Friends of Nature HFN Halifax Field Naturalists HFS Herbicide Fund Society IEL Industrial Estates Limited IMR Institute of Man and Resources JAG Joint Action Group KASE Kings Association to Save the Environment KEG Kings Environment Group LIP Local Initiatives Program LWR Light Water Reactor MEC Maritime Energy Corporation MEC Maritime Energy Coalition MOVE Movement for Citizens Voice and Action NBEPC New Brunswick Electric Power Corporation NIMBY Not In My Back Yard NPSG Nuclear Power Study Group vi NSEA Nova Scotia Environment Alliance NSEW North Shore Environment Web NSFI Nova Scotia Forest Indistries NSLPC Nova Scotia Light and Power Corporation NSPCC Northumberland Strait Pollution Control Committee NSRC Nova Scotia Research Council NSRF Nova Scotia Research Foundation NSSA Nova Scotia Salmon Association OFY Opportunities for Youth OPEC Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries PAN Pesticide Action Network PCAC Purcell's Cove Action Committee PEP People for Environmental Protection RESCUE Residents Enlisted Save Communities from Uranium Exploration SCC Science Council of Canada SEC Small Earth Community SEP Soft Energy Path SEPOHG Socialist Environmental Protection and Occupational Health Group SKMS Save Kelly's Mountain Society SSEPA South Shore Environmental Protection Association TCDD Tetrachlorodibenzodioxin VOW Voice of Women 2,4,5-T 2,4,5-Trichlorophenoxyacetic acid 2,4-D 2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid vii Acknowledgements I would like to express my appreciation and gratitude to my advisor, Dr. Claire Campbell, for her good humour, patient guidance, and sound advice over the last four years. I do not think I could imagine a better advisor, and I know that I could not have finished this work on schedule without her help. I would also like to thank my committee members, Drs. Robert Summerby- Murray, Jerry Bannister, and Alan MacEachern, for their helpful criticism and friendly advice. Similarly, I want to declare my gratitude to Dr. John Reid at Saint Mary's University and Ms. Valerie Peck at the office of the Department of History at Dalhousie University. I also wish to acknowledge the support of Dalhousie University and of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. Finally, my wife, Kazue, deserves and has my deepest gratitude for her wholehearted support of my academic pursuits. She is more responsible than she knows for my being able to complete this work viii Chapter 1 - Introduction “In Defence of Home Places” is an account of the origins and development of environmental activism in Nova Scotia from the 1960s through the 1980s. It is at the core a story about the recognition and consequences of ideological differences within the environmental movement of a modern country. The substance of the dissertation consists of three case studies of major controversies that contributed to the shape of the environmental movement as it stood in the late 1980s, which is very much as it stands at the time of writing. In every issue they pursued, environmental activists struggled to negotiate differences of opinion on the basic questions of environmentalism: the causes of environmental problems; the proper relationship of humanity to the rest of the world in which we live; and the actions most likely to achieve that relationship. By the conclusion of the third major controversy in 1985, insurmountable differences that had existed from the beginning of the movement were recognized and acknowledged by enough of its members that it became necessary to speak of mainstream and fringe environmentalisms, offering