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Why are activism and negotiation not compatible?
Practical reasons for there not being much room for activism and negotiation to sit comfortable together are supplemented by ideological reasons. For dark green environmentalists, there is no short cut to power and influence through compromise. They believe that green values can only be incorporated into a policy making system which emerges after a paradigm shift. Many do not have confidence in the sort of gradual reform espoused by light green environmentalists. In an open letter to the environment movement some years ago, Murray Bookchin exhorted: "The fear of "isolation", of "futility", of "ineffectiveness" yields a new kind of isolation, futility and ineffectiveness, namely, a complete surrender of one's most basic ideals and goals. "Power" is gained at the cost of losing the only power we really have had that can change this insane society - our moral integrity, our ideals, and our principles. This may be a festive occasion for careerists who have used the ecological issue to advance their stardom and personal fortunes; it would become the obituary of a movement that has, latent within itself, the ideals of a new world in which masses become individuals and natural resources become nature, both to be respected for their uniqueness and spirituality." Indeed the power of environmentalists in the existing socio-economic system, particularly the power they have to grant green credentials, seems particularly ephemeral. It waxes and wains according to how important a green image is to the government or to industry. In times of recession, economic priorities will seem to be dominant, then this bargaining power is significantly reduced. This became evident with the recent commitment of the Hawke government to Resource Security legislation despite the strong opposition from a range of environmental groups and promises made to environmental groups which were likely to withdraw their endorsement as a result. Taking part in the power politics and deal making in Canberra has the effect of entrenching environmental groups, in the minds of politicians, as yet another lobby group which is protecting its own interests and needs to be balanced against other lobby groups. In such a context, the bargaining power of the environmentalists as a lobby group is of utmost importance. The willingness to compromise and do trade offs in return for influence and favourable decisions promotes such a view which is anathema to dark greens who believe politicians should protect the environment because it is the right thing to do. Some issues are more amenable to negotiation. Activists set agenda by calling attention to issues. Some issues less confrontational, that is they don't challenge dominant economic and material concerns. For the dark greens making deals raises fundamental ethical questions. For them an environmental organisation does not have the right, no matter how many people it might represent, to prioritise the environment and agree to trade-offs that inevitably lead to some environmental sacrifices. Here differences in paradigms become paramount. Within the dominant paradigm, the environment is a resource and those who subscribe to it believe it is acceptable to compromise in order to save the most valuable areas. For deep ecologists, the environment has intrinsic value and so trade-offs have no place, whatsoever. For the US environmentalists who opposed Earth Day 1990, the alignment of some environmentalists with corporate and government interests meant that Earth Day tended to gloss over the deeper issues, such as the way social institutions and the economic system have contributed to environmental problems. They argued: "The polluters would have us believe that we are all just common travellers on 'Spaceship Earth,' when in fact a few of them are at the controls and the rest of us are choking on their exhaust." It has been argued that there is room in any social movement for both reformers and the more radical and so the environmental movement should be able to accommodate both the light and the dark green. However, tensions arise not only from the differing perspectives and ideologies but also from the practical effects of differing strategies. Good activism is designed to foster a sense of urgency and crisis so that people will cry out for change. Negotiation, however, can work against this by diffusing that sense of crisis and giving the impression that there is no need to worry since environmentalists are leading government in the right direction. This can be a false sense of confidence given the lack of power of negotiating environmentalists, particularly in times of recession. Activism generally aims to engender public debate but negotiation tends to inhibit it because the debate takes place behind closed doors and only emerges when the parties fail to agree. It is what Brian Martin calls an "appeal-to-elites approach" and is aimed at decision makers rather than the community in general. It does not attempt to achieve change through providing information, building networks and creating a public demand for those changes. Rather large environmental groups try to establish themselves as the representatives of all those who are environmentally inclined and to act on their behalf in negotiations with those in power. To some extent this can disenfranchise those of the dark green complexion because the more successful some environmental leaders are at persuading the public and the policy makers that they represent the environment, the more those environmentalists who hold different viewpoints are marginalised and the more difficult it is for their viewpoints to be held. This can effect which issues get on the environmental agenda. Groups such as the ACF and TWS have tended to concentrate on forestry and wilderness issues rather than issues of pollution and waste disposal. Phil Tighe and Ros Taplin noted at the Ecopolitics IV Conference: "Forestry and wilderness issues in Australian have been distinguished by three related features: they attract significant middle class popular support, particularly in the capital city electorates; they centre on the preservation (or destruction) of aesthetic landscapes at considerable distance from these urban centres of greatest support; and they never directly challenge the dominant economic and material concerns of their supporters." More importantly the stance that one takes on an issue will be determined by one's shade of green. In practice this can lead to environmentalists taking opposing sides in a controversy. The involvement of the ACF in the hazardous waste issue in the last few years has been one of working with government. They were represented on the four member Joint Taskforce on Intractable Waste which was set up to establish a high temperature incinerator for burning hazardous wastes. They negotiated with government to ensure certain conditions were incorporated into the legislation and in return they helped to convince the public that the incinerator would be completely safe and to get other environmental groups to support it. However the high temperature incinerator is an issue that highlights the differences in attitudes between light and dark greens. The ACF was opposed by other environmental groups such as Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth who raised questions about whether environmentalists should help industry to dispose of wastes that should not have been produced in the first place; questions about whether it was likely governments would build an expensive end of the pipe solution for hazardous wastes and still do all that was necessary to minimise wastes once it was built; questions about whether enough is known about hazardous waste incinerators to guarantee their safety; questions about whether, if incinerators are not safe, a rural community and its environment should be sacrificed so hazardous wastes could be moved out of the city.
Source: Sharon Beder, 'Activism versus Negotiation: Strategies for the Environment Movement', Social Alternatives, Vol. 10, no 4, December 1991, pp53-56.
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Ideology