The spacial patterning of industries primarily in indigenous and other racialized communities is an outcome of systemic racism that has been inscribed within environmental policy and is not dissimilar from any other policy, whether you're talking about health policy, policy in education, or immigration policy. It stems from the people who get to make decisions. The people who get to make decisions are never people who look like me typically, or just one or two.
This is once again about power. When we look at departments of environment, the people who have the most power, the people who get to write policies are those who are middle class and white. Directly or indirectly, knowingly or unknowingly, as people we hold the least perceptions about other people. We certainly hold beliefs about those who are “othered”.
Those ideologies, beliefs and perceptions that we hold about those who are considered to be “other” get inscribed within environmental policies in very subtle ways. That's why we call it systemic racism, because it's not overt. It's not direct. It's subtle. It's silent.
The way it gets inscribed within environmental policy is through ideologies that determine who matters and who doesn't. That's very difficult for white people to admit to, I understand, but we all hold what we call unconscious biases. When you write those policies, in very subtle ways you want to make sure that your group is protected.
That was highlighted to me during a presentation I gave at Dalhousie when a white student stood up and said to me after I gave a talk, “So what are you proposing, Dr. Waldron, that they put it in our community?” When she said that, I thought, “Ah, there we go.”
We may not want to admit that, but we hold ideas about who matters, who doesn't matter, who has value and who doesn't have value. If we are honest with ourselves, we know that people who look like me, and indigenous people in this country and around the world are seen as having less value and less worth.