Environmental Activism on the Ground: Small Green and Indigenous Organizing ed. by Jonathan Clapperton and Liza Piper (review)

In the history of environmentalism in Canada, the United States, and beyond, smaller local and Indigenous environmental groups and actions are often left out of the narrative in favour of large national (and international) groups and actions. This collection of articles and essays focuses on the important contribution of Indigenous and small green environmental activism. As the editors note, the rationale for the book's focus is that these groups "served as more than just building blocks from which larger, more powerful environmental organizations emerged (p. 3). The power of this book is this focus on groups that have been largely neglected by mainstream surveys of environmentalism.

Environmental Activism on the Ground focuses on the importance of local action as well as the intersection of environmentalism with larger issues of Indigenous rights and sovereignty. The focus on small green activism is intentional, as they "represent a strand within the history of North American environmentalism, one in which workers, women, small business people, Indigenous activists, and other marginalized groups feature more prominently as compared to their roles in the largest green organizations" (p. 3). This focus, along with the division of the book into two parts—Part 1: Processes and Possibilities and Part 2: Histories—creates a versatile text that works well. Editors Clapperton and Piper point out, "We wanted to develop something more than a strictly chronological structure or an endless list of themes with little in common" (p. xiv).

One of the strengths of this text is the inclusion of Indigenous environmental struggles that are too often excluded from environmental history or framed as monolithic. In this way, the text highlights "the diverse interactions Indigenous peoples have had in environmental activism, relationships—both cooperative and confrontational—with environmentalists or initiatives labelled as such" (p. 7). This approach is evident in the first chapter, "Strategies for Survival: First Nations Encounters with Environmentalism" (pp. 23–46), Anna J. Willow's examination of Grassy Narrows First Nation work with Rainforest Action Network in Ontario and West Moberly First Nations collaboration with the Boreal Leadership Council (BLC) in BC. Willow frames these alliances as strategic acts of survival and argues that the First Nations activists she has had the opportunity to talk with see environmentalism as a "label used by outsiders to describe what Indigenous people have been doing all along" (p. 37). This chapter is complemented by Zoltan Grossman's chapter, "Native/Non-Native Alliances Challenging Fossil Fuel Industry Shipping at Pacific Northwest Ports" (pp. 47–72). Grossman argues, "To stand in solidarity with Indigenous nations is not just to 'support Native rights' but to strike at the very underpinnings of the Western social order" (p. 65). This sentiment, and this chapter, could not be timelier considering the blockades in support of Indigenous sovereignty taking place all across Canada in the winter of 2020.

Environmental Activism on the Ground is relevant and timely in bringing a spotlight to the importance of any environmental struggle taking into account Indigenous concerns and their sense of place and sovereignty. Both Sterling Evans's "From Southern Alberta to Northern Brazil: Indigenous Conservation and the Preservation of Cultural Resources" (pp. 99–126) and Jessica DeWitt's "Parks For and By the People: Acknowledging Ordinary People in the Formation, Protection, and Use of State and Provincial Parks" (pp. 127–152) underline the importance of a sense of place and rootedness in the land and how it is imperative that environmentalists respect and acknowledge Indigenous rights in any endeavour. Jessica Dewitt makes a keen observation about the need for more inclusive environmental history in noting that "historians need to look to the peripheries of parks, to the communities of individuals pushed out of the parkland by park legislation or drawn to the parks by promises of opportunity" (p. 144). It is fitting that hers is the last chapter of Part 1, opening up the way for an...