The article by Holley Knaus in the September 1992 issue regarding the differences between Cultural Survival and Survival International's point of view about the "development" of the rainforest economy in Brazil raises a very important - indeed a fundamental - set of issues regarding "sustainability." Both points of view have sensible-sounding arguments. Cultural Survival's idea is that if the forests can be seen as economically "valuable" in the North's terms as they are, then there will be less pressure by governments and other powerful groups to treat them as "underutilized land" ripe for "development." Survival International, on the other hand, argues that it is poor policy for indigenous peoples to become dependent on an uncertain, even fickle, global market for their livelihoods.
On the whole, my sentiments lie more with the arguments of Survival International. But the debate does raise the question of what level of economic exportation indigenous peoples (or, for that matter, any peoples anywhere) ought to become dependent on. Are there any principles to guide us here?
I suggest that people should live beyond their environmental income, on a sustainable basis. They should always be able to generate at least a subsistence level of survival from their own lands - those demarcated to them by binding agreements. Any production greater than subsistence might be then traded for different surpluses from elsewhere. But to become dependent on that trade for survival was courting disaster and inviting exploitation, of both labor and resources.
I believe this principle offers a reasonable guideline for different societies in determining how much of their resource base to "commoditize" in the global marketplace. If well- meaning groups, such as Cultural Survival and Survival International, would help indigenous peoples to make this evaluation - and show them the dangers of over- dependency on uncontrollable external markets - then they may be able to achieve improved economic benefits without endangering their future well-being and the sustainability of their subsistence resource base.
Yours truly,
Mary E. Clark
Professor Emerita
of Conflict Resolution
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA
To the editor:
I read your magazine frequently, and appreciate the variety and quality of information it offers. However, I must register one small complaint: the cute headline "The Tree Whackers" tagged on to the otherwise excellent Weyerhaeuser profile really bothered me [Multinational Monitor, October 1992].
I was born in Washington state and have spent 35 years watching Weyerhaeuser at work. These guys (and they are guys) are forest-killers and ecosystem-destroyers. To call them tree whackers is to trivialize what they do in the same way the company does when it calls itself the "Tree Growing Company." This corporation has irrevocably altered the health of our forests, rivers, wildlife habitat and rich agricultural lands with their monoculture tree farms and malls. There is nothing trivial or cute about it.
Sincerely,
Janine Blaeloch
Seattle, WA