Background
Previous work by the NRE research team was organized around four themes Communication, Services, Governance and Capacity. The current round of SSHRC funding is centered on the theme of Capacity. While the other themes have remained the same, the entire group recognized that the earlier round of research had neglected consideration of the environment and natural resources. Members of the former Capacity theme team all have expertise and interest in various natural resource sectors and so this same group (with one addition) decided to turn their collective attention to how the environment still matters in rural society in Canada.

If you watch much the popular media you might easily get the impression that traditional sectors such as farming, fishing, forestry, and mining are in decline and that they will not be major players in the hi-tech, digital world that most people think of when they consider the New Economy. And yet, we cannot escape the fact that we need to eat, build shelter to live in, create heat to make our harsh winter climate tolerable. Therefore, we are quite confident that these sectors will continue to play a major role in Canadian society, particularly rural society.

This is not to suggest that these industries and sectors are not transforming. Nothing could be further from the truth. Technological change, attitudinal change, global competition, changing regulatory and policy frameworks have altered the way the work in these sectors get done. Frequently, capital is substituted for labour with the result that these sectors do not employ as many people as they once did. The trade-off for this is better working conditions and often better wages for those that remain in these sectors. However, loss of employment in these sectors has been a major factor in the transformation of many rural communities.

Work in this theme spans a broad range of topics – from defining exactly what we mean by “the environment and natural resources” (Natural Capital Project), to an examination of rural and urban people’s attitudes toward the environment, to studies of community governance of natural resources or barriers to the development of such models. We are also examining the resilience of communities, in two dimensions. We are using community capacity to examine the potential for communities to adapt to climate change, and we are creating narratives about communities experiences, both positive and negative, as they struggle to navigate the transition from the “old economy” dominated by these resources sectors, to a “new economy” where these resource sectors will play a part, but in quite a different manner and with a host of other considerations.

Rural communities in Canada: Continuing traditions and adaptation to change

Our research team has a vast knowledge and extensive experience in resource dependent communities that have struggled to adapt to changing social values, changing markets, and changing regulatory and policy environments. Some of these communities have responded extremely well to these challenges, either by remaining competitive in traditional sectors, or by diversifying, or by building new opportunities in the wake of a collapse in a traditional resource sector. Other communities have fared less well, and have been less able to adapt to changing conditions. The results of this inability to adapt are declining populations, aging infrastructure, social pathologies, unemployment, declining real estate values, and the like.

Often the success or failure of communities has to do with a combination of their community capacity and the health and abundance or their natural resource endowments (forests, fishers, ore, minerals, soil, etc). This research team will be producing a book dealing with these issues. The book will be a co-edited volume, the bulk of which will be comprised of chapters that profile single communities. We will document both success stories and struggles with adaptation to changing conditions. Through narratives we will identify factors that appear to have been critical for success, and factors that appear to have inhibited positive change. Given the broad representation of community types that will be represented in the volume, anyone familiar or interested in rural Canada will be able to find inspiration and insight from these stories.