The proposal
to establish Marine Protected Areas (MPAs), made by the Canadian
Department of Fisheries and Oceans
(DFO), under the new 1996 Oceans Act needs
to apply deep ecology to an actual
environmental issue. The literature that I have seen
on MPAs seems to appeal to human
economic self-interest, such as how fishers can
benefit. Yet fishers seem to
feel that they have some proprietary lock on the oceans
from which the public is excluded.
It seems a stupid strategy to try and mollify fishers
while trying to establish MPAs.
In order to create fully protected, extensive ocean
sanctuaries which are not undercut
by fishing or fossil fuel interests there must be a
new social base, including more
than just fisher people. Conservation must raise an
all-species perspective and oppose
anthropocentrism. The primary issue in any MPA
discussion should be philosophical,
trying to change how humans look at the oceans
and their life forms.
Choices
in life are driven by philosophy, although few of us think about how our
actions and philosophies are
related. Those who support deep ecology believe that
there has to be a fundamental
change in consciousness of how humans relate to the
natural world. This requires
a change from an anthropocentric to an ecocentric
perspective-seeing humans as
a species with no superior status. All other species
have a right to exist, irrespective
of their usefulness to the human species. Humans
cannot presume dominance over
all non-human species of life and see nature as a
resource for our utilization.
We have to extend the ethical circle outwards, towards
the oceans and the Earth. All
life is one.
The
true conservationist, or Earth-citizen, must be prepared to oppose his/her
own self-interest for the benefit
of other creatures and their habitats. The justification
for MPAs should not be one of
self-interest. Protection of marine areas should not
be based on which (human) shareholders
shout the loudest in opposition. A
fundamental question about MPAs
is whether to appeal to economic interests or to
rise above this, by promoting
overall ecological and social interests.
A Marine
Protected Area must mean full ecological protection from human
exploitive interests, otherwise
the term itself becomes debased. Degrees of restriction
of the human use of an oceans
area could be encompassed, using another term such
as Marine Regulated Area, rather
than using, and debasing, the term "protected area."
According
to the Oceans Act, MPAs rest on an assertion of ownership over the
internal waters, the territorial
sea and the exclusive economic zone. In a press release
December 19, 1996, the federal
fishing minister said the passage of the Oceans Act
"reaffirms Canada's sovereign
ocean rights..." Supporters of deep ecology believe no
one can own the Earth, whether
from a state, individual or collective point of view.
Asserted ownership is ultimately
a convenient social fiction deriving from a human
society bent on enforcing a claim
of control over other creatures and the Earth itself.
The
Oceans Act is not based on deep ecology. According to this Act, Canada's
Ocean Management Strategy (of
which MPAs are a part) is to be based on support
for the principles of sustainable
development. This concept, which sanctifies continuous
economic growth and consumerism,
should not be accepted. We need to drastically
scale back economic growth and
consumerism not expand it. Mathis Wackernagel
and William Rees, in their 1996
book Our Ecological Footprint, though presenting
quite a human-centered perspective,
point out that to live sustainably, we must ensure
"that we use the essential products
and processes of nature no more quickly than they
can be renewed, and that we discharge
wastes no more quickly than they can be
absorbed." Moreover, they point
out that if everyone on Earth had the average
Canadian or American lifestyle,
then three planets would be needed for a sustainable
lifestyle for the world's population.
The
Oceans Act uses the word "resource" to cover non-human creatures living
in the
oceans. The automatic assumption
that nature is a resource for corporate and human
use is an indication of our total
alienation from the natural world. It implies a human-
centered, utilitarian world view
and that humans are somehow the pinnacle of evolution.
The
word "stakeholder" means anyone interested in MPAs, lumping together those
who want to exploit the oceans
with people who have ecological and social interests.
It makes no distinction between,
say, inshore fishers who have a long term personal
commitment to living off of the
oceans, and oil and gas companies who pack up and
move whenever richer fields are
found. The concept seems to imply that out of the
various competing interests,
a lowest common denominator, general good will emerge.
Ultimately, we are all stakeholders
in a planetary well-being sense, yet non-human
stakeholders are not considered.
In terms of MPAs, who has more at stake than the
seals, the fish and the algae?
The Oceans Act says that its legislation upholds existing treaty rights
of aboriginal
peoples as outlined in the Constitution
Act of 1982, under section 35. Translated, this
means that a MPA can be subject
to exploitation by aboriginal peoples. This puts
ecology subordinate to human
society.
The
DFO seems to have replaced Parks Canada as the leading federal agency in
marine protection, yet it has
been intimately concerned with promoting corporate
exploitive interests in fisheries
policies. Put another way, the DFO does not question
the assumption that marine ecology
should serve the industrial capitalist economy. For
Parks Canada, maintenance of
ecological integrity was considered the first priority in
park zoning and visitor use.
The
nature of our capitalist society influences how we think about MPAs. I support
protecting marine areas, but
free of human exploitation. MPAs need to become a
reflection of ecocentric thinking.
The question is: Will MPAs be the beginning of a new
ecological way of preservation
or a subterfuge for the continued industrial exploitation
of the oceans using greenwashing?
A step
in choosing marine areas to protect is to assess all the stakeholders. Humans
are one group-those with a direct
economic interest being only a sub-group. After all,
the term protected area implies
protection from humans. The other stakeholders, who
usually remain voiceless at meetings,
are the marine animals, plants and other organisms.
Their interests have to be given
more weight than human concerns.
MPAs
cannot be just minor set-asides. We cannot have dead zones between them.
MPAs are not about creating wildlife
reservations, because the nature of our society
influences life inside these
areas. Wider phenomena, like global warming, do not stop at
MPA boundaries. Therefore a new,
global, marine vision is necessary. Why don't we
set aside oceans giving them
protected status and then have workshops and meetings
about which small areas should
be opened up for human exploitation, of course, done
sustainably?
David
Orton, is coordinator of the Green Web environmental research group.
He lives
on an old hill farm in Nova Scotia, Canada, and engages in developing
the left
biocentric tendency in deep ecology.
Green Web, R.R. #3, Saltsprings, Nova Scotia, Canada,
BOK 1PO
E-mail us at: greenweb@ca.inter.net