This weeks readings discuss rivers, and ultimately the unfortunate disruption of their flow due to the 1,000’s of dams constructed around the world.
Campbell discusses the ecological roll of rivers (their power and their services to nature), while also discussing the change brought upon them by human development. She also critiques human viewpoints of natural systems, particularly recognizing how our perception of efficiency or ‘natural’ affects our ability to properly judge restoration/river development. She discusses a perspective taken up along the Ohio, saying, “[to fix navigation problems] we thought, if we removed the jams, dredged the riverbed, confined the river to a single channel, built levees to contain floodwaters, and stored water behind locks and dams for release during dry periods. Between 1825 and 1930, we worked very hard to improve this river—to make it closer to what we thought it should be like” (p. 19). Ultimately, the ‘restoration’ of this river was a failure, and created more problems within the area such as reduced fish stock.
Pearce, in his piece When Rivers Run Dry, discusses the ultimate failure of dams to uphold their promised outputs. There were multiple cases of dams proving to be a money drain; essentially outweighing all the benefits to irrigation and energy production that were foretold. This poses an issue for environmentalism, where over 60 countries receive half their energy from hydroelectric dams, which has been marketed as clean energy. This is not the ultimate motivating factor to dam construction however. When the dam-building boom in the early 20th century took way, it was partially to put people to work, partially as a platform the modern man/nature dualism, and partially for providing water to booming industry and agriculture miles away from rivers. The construction of these dams fed the modern industrial western world, while leaving indigenous cultures and their water methods literally drowned.
LaDuke discusses the construction of dams systems in Canada, which will directly impact the native populations that rely on healthy ecosystems in the area. Historically, dam construction has displaced groups all over the world, either indigenous or just dispensable in the eyes of the state and the modern era. The Cree people experienced poverty and extreme levels of substance abuse following the flooding of their land. Suicide rates, at times reaching 10 times the national average, also plague these displaced peoples. With their land flooded, they are then resorting to purchasing food at the grocery store, as opposed to receiving it from the land which once provided a bounty.
IF we are to decide that dams ultimately provide no benefit that can outweigh the ecological, economic, and cultural toll to earths inhabitants (as all of the pieces this week highlight issues from all three of those categories) how do we prevent the continued production of them? The issue of dam construction at this point in time seems nearly redundant, but functions on the platform of neoliberalism, settler colonialism, and racist capitalism. A tyranny of water corporations, the World Bank, and the state function to silence many of those who speak against their construction.
If we do dismantle those powers, do we breach every dam in the world; which come first? Once the rivers are free to assume their uninterrupted course, how much work goes into aiding them back to what we have defined as ‘natural’ in an era that still function on dominion over nature.
What is natural?
Scale and temporality are important considerations when answering.
Dams are massive structures that have been built to serve a purpose, and that is to provide energy and a water source for people, among other things. To remove them would take an incredibly long time, as they would alter the way of the river and the surrounding ecosystem. Removing dams is no easy task. As with the example of the river in Ohio from Campbell’s reading, restoring rivers could detrimental effects, some that could be permanent and/ or extremely difficult to fix. It is hard to say how we could stop the continued production of dams, because people seem to think they are necessary to have. This may be the case in some regions, but there are other ways that electricity and water could be retrieved. If we were to dismantle those big water corporations, I don’t think we would need to breach every dam in the world, but some would definitely have to be. Once rivers are free to flow their own course again, so much work will need to be put in to fix what has been done by the dam. It will be a process. Going back to its ‘natural’ state may never be achieved again. When I think of the meaning of the word natural, I think of something that has been untouched by humans, something magnificent in its beauty and strength. Often when I think of the definition, I think of something like the Grand Canyon; it has been virtually untouched by humans, carved by water through time, nature running its own course through the ground.
In answering your question “how do we prevent the continued production of [dams]?”, I would argue that it will require a drastic change in national energy sources worldwide. At the beginning of dam construction, in short term, it was seen as an improvement as appose to using fossil fuel energy. After all, dams are hydro-energy and thus viewed as a renewable resource. However, despite this as we’ve seen dams are highly disruptive of the ecological systems and metabolic rift. Thus, we must switch our societies to operate off of solar energy, an actual renewable resource that is highly neglected. This will take considerable policy reformation, yet is achievable.
In answering “what is natural”, in one sense everything on Earth is initially created from nature so one may argue that anything is natural. Additionally humans are a species that are apart of nature, so one may argue that our actions are natural, human tendencies. This makes the definition of “natural” ultimately endless and thus can cause allot of confusion in discourse. I was reading a book yesterday called “From the Ground Up” where the authors described that they expanded their definition of the word “environment” to include peoples living situations and surroundings, whether that be man-made or not. They did this intentionally so that more people who are not immediately connected to nature could still feel a relation to it, and thus prompt them to be more involved in the issues. Basically, I do not think there is a single use for the word “natural” as definitions are up for interpretation.
Thank you for this amazing post. Its exactly what I needed to read today. Labcorp