Conservation-Native American Style

Abstract:     
Over the past three decades, the environmental movement has promoted a view of American Indians as the "original conservationists"-that is, "people so intimately bound to the land that they have left no mark upon it" (White and Cronon 1988, 417). References to this image abound: "The Indians were, in truth, the pioneer ecologists of this country," said Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall.(1) "I think most people in Indian country hold a set of ideals we should all learn from," said law professor Charles Wilkinson in a recent speech.(2) According to Wilkinson, these ideals teach human harmony with the natural environment. Calling for an environmental ethic patterned after that of Native Americans, Senator John H. Chafee recently quoted words allegedly spoken by Chief Seattle. "Man did not weave the web of life. He is merely a strand of it." "For many thousands of years, most of the indigenous nations on this continent practiced a philosophy of protection (first) and use (second) of the forest," says Herb Hammond in the Sierra Club book Clearcut. "In scientific terms, we recognize that their use of the forest was ecologically responsible-meaning that it kept all the parts."(3) Appealing as this image of a Native American environmental ethic is, it is not accurate. The spiritual connection attributed to Native Americans frequently does not mesh with the history of Indian resource use. By focusing on this myth instead of reality, environmentalists patronize American Indians, disparaging their rich institutional heritage which encouraged resource conservation. By missing this history of Indian institutions, the environmentalists' interpretation deprives Indians and non-Indians alike of a full understanding of how we can conserve our natural heritage. The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, it will put to rest the myth of a unique and romantic American Indian environmental ethic. Second, it will illustrate how American Indians used complex and evolving institutions to conserve scarce natural resources and to survive in a sometimes hostile environment. By institutions, I mean the traditions, rules, laws and habits that guided Indian societies. Though the actual laws and customs vary among societies, all societies have such institutions to guide them.

JEL Classifications: Q20, Q30, P40

Accepted Paper Series