Introduction
International environmental non-governmental organizations (IENGOs), such as Sea Shepherd, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), and International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), have a long and checkered history of involvement and impact in, and on, the North, but, perhaps, the most infamous IENGO in the region is Greenpeace. Greenpeace is arguably the most stigmatized IENGO in the North American North (Alaska, Northern Canada, and Greenland). It is “one of the largest [with] offices in 40 countries and more than 2.8 million financial supporters and members” (Chasek, Downie, & Brown, Reference Chasek, Downie and Brown2014, p.86) with a structure made up of Greenpeace International with responsibilities, such as global campaign coordination, protecting and managing the Greenpeace trademark, developing Greenpeace priorities, monitoring strategic and financial performances, and operating the Greenpeace fleet and Greenpeace national and regional organizations, which are separate legal entities who are “responsible for implementing and carrying out campaigns that fall under the long-term global campaign program” (Greenpeace, 2020).
In the North, Greenpeace’s brand is synonymous with the anti-sealing movement of the 1970s–80s; a movement largely seen locally as undermining the cultures and economies of coastal and rural communities. This branding makes it difficult for national branches of the organization in Arctic states and Greenpeace International to advance their “Save the Arctic” agenda in the region. Using the Greenpeace experiences as a case study, this paper explores the questions: why are IENGOs stigmatized in the North American North and how might they overcome their stigma with local audiences?
The paper seeks to illustrate how IENGO self-reflection can encourage organizational change, particularly in situations where past actions which caused stigmatization hinder current opportunities due to changes in desired target audiences and legitimacy standards. The paper uses two examples of Greenpeace’s contemporary effort at Arctic engagement: Greenpeace Nordic’s 2010–11 involvement in Nuuk, Greenland, against Cairn Oil exploration and Greenpeace Canada’s 2014–17 Clyde River, Nunavut, Canada, community alliance against offshore seismic testing. This paper illustrates the beginning of Greenpeace’s 21st century self-reflection on why it is stigmatized in the North American North, how it might overcome this stigma, and at what cost. Specifically, it looks at Greenpeace’s stigma among Inuit communities, Greenpeace’s ability and willingness to adapt to overcome its stigma, and what Greenpeace’s experience might teach other IENGOs wishing to engage in the North American North.
Data collection
This paper is informed by semi-structured, in-depth interviews, of which 37 have been conducted (as of February 2019) in 2018 and 2019 (with one additional interview from 2016). Interviews were conducted with various representatives of Greenpeace who work, or have worked, on Arctic and northern matters; WWF representatives working on Arctic issues for the Global Arctic Program and Arctic state national offices; Inuit representatives and community leaders like Jerry Natanine, the Mayor of Kangiqtugaapik/Clyde River, and Paul A. Quassa, former Premier of Nunavut; and academics who have worked with Inuit communities and representatives, such as Warren Bernauer, an academic who worked with Mayor Natanine and a retired academic, using a pseudonym, who consulted with the Arctic Council and has over 20 years of polar research experience.
Some interviewees requested that their identities be concealed, and in these cases, generic references to their organization or role are used instead – for example, WWF representative 1. All individuals whose names were used in this piece gave consented prior to publication. It should be noted one individual spoken to and referred to in this piece from Greenpeace asked to have their identity concealed. This individual was spoken to for a prior project in 2016. The majority of interviews referenced were conducted in person and by telephone/Skype in 2018 and 2019, and most interviewees permit the use of their identity in publications from the research project from which this paper is a part. Overall, the research received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement (No. 746312), with additional interview sources coming from a research project on Arctic Council diplomacy (Project Number: CF15-0434) funded by the Carlsberg Foundation as part of the Distinguished Postdoctoral Research Fellowship.
Legitimacy and stigma
There are two core concepts – legitimacy and stigma – explored when considering how externally based IENGOs with stigma in the North can work to overcome their stigma and (re)establish themselves as legitimate in the eyes of local actors. In academic literature, legitimacy is a hard-to-define concept, and one that is often discussed as a relational concept between audiences and actors seeking it. Thrandardottir (Reference Thrandadottir2013, p.2) defines legitimacy as “something an entity can claim, maintain, and reproduce and, thus, establish over time, and then use to underpin or provide credibility to other legitimacy claims.” Moreover, Thrandardottir presents legitimacy as a signaling device that demonstrates that an “NGO has a right to operate and that what it does is in some way good and benefits society as a whole” (2013, p.2). Thrandardottir’s link between legitimacy and the right to operate connects to Clark’s body of work on legitimacy, specifically to the concept of rightful membership (for example, Clark, Reference Clark2003, Reference Clark2007a,b,c). Clark argues that legitimacy is more than just acceptance of an actor’s stance, work, or existence; “what is crucial is not simply de facto acceptance, but a sense of rightful membership” (Clark, Reference Clark2007a; also see Clark, Reference Clark2007c, p.325).
The right to “membership” in formal and informal arenas is a big part of debate over NGO participation in politics. For NGOs, the relational dynamics between audiences and actors is the bedrock of an NGOs struggle to be seen as legitimate in their area of work (Hudson, Reference Hudson2001, p.332). Atack (Reference Atack1999, p.857; quotation in original text) elaborates, noting that legitimacy is “associated with moral justification for political and social action.” Lister (Reference Lister2003, p.177) adds that legitimacy, particularly in “advocacy work, is often considered to rest on issues of representativeness.” The nuances of representativeness are a long-standing concern in NGO research, as the issues of who are NGOs representing, who do they claim to represent, to what extent do they represent certain actors, and to whom are they accountable, and why are at the heart of debates over NGO participation in politics and the agendas for which they advocate.
Questions over who NGOs represent are tied to discussions over legitimacy and audiences. There are at least three forms of legitimacy that illuminate the manner in which NGOs might be found lacking: moral, pragmatic, and cognitive (Suchman, Reference Suchman1995). Of the forms of legitimacy outlined by Suchman (Reference Suchman1995), it is moral legitimacy that non-Northern-based NGOs (including IENGOs) are often seen as lacking from the perceptive of Northern audiences.
Moral legitimacy is socially constructed by giving and considering the reasons for justifying certain actions, practices, or institutions … audiences can assess an organization’s moral legitimacy by evaluating … outputs and consequences (doing the rights things), techniques and procedures (doing things rights), categories and structures (the right organization for the job), and leaders and representatives (the right person in charge of the tasks) (Liu, Eng, & Sekhon, Reference Liu, Eng and Sekhon2013, p.635).
NGOs are tied to the concept of moral legitimacy because they are actors that frequently claim to be operating on behalf of the common good (Baur and Palazzo, Reference Baur and Palazzo2011, p.584; Marberg, Kranenburg, & Korzilius, Reference Marberg, Kranenburg and Korzilius2016, pp.2737–2738). Therefore, NGO “existence and practice is most logically supported by, and judged according to, what we would call ‘moral norms’ … [and] moral norms include normative understandings of good practice widely accepted across the sector … as well as [the] NGOs’ stated values” (Waite, Reference Waite2017).
The implications of a lack of moral legitimacy are important to appreciate because it hinders an IENGOs work given that the traditional role of NGOs has been to “point out problems in society and give a voice to the marginalized, and this ‘moral voice’ is what strengthens their legitimacy” (Puljek-Shank, Reference Puljek-Shank2019, p.7). One such implication is the stigmatization of an individual or group of NGO actors due to a deficit of moral legitimacy because it is “the most meaningful type for judging the legitimacy of NGOs” (Baur & Palazzo, Reference Baur and Palazzo2011, p.584).
Understanding the process of stigmatization is vital to understand what issues IENGOs face when trying to engage audiences in the North American North and also the steps they might make in order to help address the stigmatization. This is emphasized by the fact that: “Organizational stigmatization and moral legitimacy are closely linked in the sense that they are both concerned with moral judgments. Audiences confer stigmatization ‘to expose something unusual and bad about the moral status of the signifier’ (Goffman, Reference Goffman1963, p.1) and moral legitimacy due to a ‘positive normative evaluation’ (Suchman, Reference Suchman1995, p.579)” (as quoted in Hampel & Tracey, Reference Hampel and Tracey2019, p.11).
The research on stigma began in the fields of sociology and psychology with an initial focus on the individual (for example, Blodorn & Major, 2016; Goffman, Reference Goffman1963; Link & Phelan, Reference Link and Phelan2001). Stigmas can be quite powerful in their ability to influence the degree to which an individual can participate in groups and organizations. This is because stigma is linked to issues of agency. Barker (Reference Barker2008) observes that “[t]he concept of agency has commonly been associated with notions of: freedom; free will; action; creativity; originality; the very possibility of change through the actions of free agents” (Barker, Reference Barker2008, p.234). Stigma is linked to the concept of agency, because people exert their agency in order to stigmatize, or destigmatize, something or someone (Whitley & Campbell, Reference Whitley and Campbell2014).
As such, a stigma can result in actors labeling others and branding them as “deviant and undesirable” (Connor, Reference Connor, Forsyth and Copes2014). Crocker, Major, and Steele (Reference Crocker, Major, Steele, Fiske, Gilbert and Lindzey1998) refine the definition of stigma by stating that “stigmatized individuals possess (or are believed to possess) some attribute, or characteristic, that conveys a social identity that is devalued in a particular social context” (Crocker et al., Reference Crocker, Major, Steele, Fiske, Gilbert and Lindzey1998, p.505 as quoted in Blodorn & Major, 2016). According to Pescosilido and Martin (Reference Pescosilido and Martin2015, p.91), stigma “is the mark, the condition, or status that is subject to devaluation,” and “[s]tigmatization is the social process by which the mark affects the lives of all those touched by it.” Initially, work on stigma focused on stigmatization of individuals on the basis of overt, physical or social, features that would distinguish people in a way that carries negative connotations within a society and/or time period, such as birthmarks, loss of limbs, and skin color or ethnicity, as well as stigma associated with a person having a mental disability.
The concept of stigma, however, is also applicable in more macro-level analysis of actors like a country, organization, or part of the world. Stigma, at the wider level, is referred to as tribal (or collective) stigma, which means it has a stigma “attached to the group rather than to the individual” (Gardner & Gronfein, Reference Gardner, Gronfein, Forsyth and Copes2014). This is one of the three forms of stigma identified by Goffman (Reference Goffman1963) in his work; the other forms being individual and physical stigma. With tribal stigma, the stigma “can be transmitted through lineages and equally contaminate all members of a family” (Page, Reference Page1984, p.4), resulting in a guilt-by-association or membership.
The catalyst of stigma: IENGOs, Inuit, and the North
The anti-sealing and anti-whaling movements of the 1970s–90s are major catalysts of the stigmatization of IENGOs in the North (Wessendorf, Reference Wessendorf2011, p.27). Within the North American North, the anti-sealing movement had the most impact on local perceptions of IENGOs. The anti-sealing movement began 1969 when “the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) began to mobilize public opinion against the annual hunt of baby [white coat] harp seals off Canada’s east coast” (Woods, Reference Woods1986, p.2). Greenpeace joined the protest “against what they perceived as the savage, uncontrolled slaughter of helpless baby seals for their white pelts” (Woods, Reference Woods1986, p.2) in 1971 shortly after its formation in Canada, and its successful protest against nuclear weapons testing in Amchitka Island, Alaska (Hunter, Reference Hunter2004; also see Greenpeace New Zealand, n.d.).
Rural-based sealers were disadvantaged in the fight, caught unaware, and unprotected while trying to practice traditional lifestyles. Inuit and other Indigenous hunters (such as the Innu and Mi’kmaq of Newfoundland and Labrador) got caught in the attack by actors that did not bother to learn the nuances of the societies they were targeting or how, and to what extent, they participated in traditional sealing practices and the sealing economy. Local people, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, felt attacked and bullied by organizations and people who they perceived as being disconnected and disrespectful of their cultures, traditions, and histories (Dauvergne, Reference Dauvergne2008; Phelps Bondaroff & Burke, Reference Phelps Bondaroff and Burke2014).
For local audiences predominately in the rural parts of the North American North, IENGOs lost moral legitimacy with their messages and delivery styles. One reason for the outcome was that IENGOs, like Greenpeace, rarely distributed images that showed the negative local experience to their campaigning (Kalland, Reference Kalland2009, pp.82–83). While this selective editing is commonplace for IENGOs trying to frame a subject, it also opened up the organization to critique from its detractor for misrepresentation of situations through its “[s]killful manipulation of the mass media, [which] engender[ed] enormous sympathy for their cause” (Kalland, Reference Kalland2009, p.82). Among Greenpeace’s detractors are present-day Inuit whom Greenpeace hopes to engage for their Arctic agenda. Their old media materials, however, are effectively the evidence upon which their past sins are displayed and they are judged.
A core issue at the heart of the current IENGO stigma is that the movement prioritized nature over people. This is a philosophical point for IENGOs, which range in types, strategies, objectives, and size, going from a more conservative conservationist approach toward environmental protection (for example, WWF, Sierra Club) to a more radical deep ecology-animal rights approach (for example, IFAW, Greenpeace, Sea Sheppard).
This commitment to nature over people is a point some Northerners perceive as fundamentally against how they view their interconnected relationships with their homelands and their ability to survive in them (Dauvergne, Reference Dauvergne2008; Phelps Bondaroff & Burke, Reference Phelps Bondaroff and Burke2014). As one local in Canada expressed:
I would say that, on a lot of these environmentally oriented international organizations who really put the environment first without really taking into consideration traditional harvesting practices and Inuit culture or any other Indigenous cultures … I am not saying that the organizations are not doing it [taking traditional practices and cultures into consideration], they probably are, but it is just a perception I have on how people see those things (Telephone interview with Nathan Cohen-Fournier, socio-economic development officer for the Makivik Cooperation, 23 January 2019).
The perception that IENGOs, and Greenpeace in particular, view the world differently from Inuit exists in Greenland, too. As one retired civil servant reflected:
If you want to spoil any party in Greenland, just mention the word Greenpeace. They are very much seen as “the enemy,” crazy hat ladies with no real concerns like Bridget Bardot … Greenpeace effectively ruined the market for seal skin in the world and made it impossible to maintain a livelihood on your home turf. They are seen as a destroyer of Greenlandic culture (Interview with a retired civil servant, 24 January 2019).
The perception that Inuit were not represented by IENGOs in the 1970s–80s anti-sealing movement is clear, and the perception exists locally that contemporary IENGO interests in Northern engagement are grounded in an idealization of the North.
The impact of the anti-sealing movement was amplified by Inuit isolation, restricted economic opportunities, and a lack of recognition for their cultural practices (Phelps Bondaroff & Burke, Reference Phelps Bondaroff and Burke2014, p.13).
While protesters watched the collapse of Canada’s east coast whitecoat sealing industry with satisfaction … the Government of the Northwest Territories [NWT; which represented the area of present day NWT and Nunavut] estimated that 18 of 20 Inuit villages in the NWT lost 60% of the total annual community income because of the European Economic Community [EEC; precursor to the European Union] ban – a loss that affected 1500 Inuit hunters and their families … In Resolute, for example, income from sealing dropped from $54000 in 1982 to $1000 in 1983” (Woods, Reference Woods1986, p.2).
Inuit communities were ill-equipped at the time to mount an effective counter-narrative to the sensationalized media coverage which “failed to adequately distinguish between subsistence-style hunting done for traditional and cultural reasons and commercial hunts” and cast sealing as a barbaric practice (Phelps Bondaroff & Burke, Reference Phelps Bondaroff and Burke2014, pp.12–13; Woods, Reference Woods1986, pp.2–3).
Rise of Inuit empowerment in the North American North
In their work on the power of stigma, Link and Phelan (Reference Link and Phelan2014, p.24) note that the “stigmatizers have strong motivations to keep people down, in, or away and that they best achieve these aims through stigma processes that are indirect, broadly effective, and hidden in taken-for-granted cultural circumstances.” IENGOs stigmatized the sealing industry and now actors, like Inuit communities, are increasingly empowered and keen not to fall victim to outside agendas again and have, in turn, stigmatized their former attackers.
For a stigma to be attributed, someone must be the stigmatizer. According to Link and Phelan (Reference Link and Phelan2001, p.375), “[s]tigma is entirely dependent on social, economic, and political power – it takes power to stigmatize.” Changes in Inuit legal, cultural, and political power in Canada and Greenland since the collapse of the sealing industry in the 1980s, for example, have empowered the Inuit to identify and push back against actors they feel have negatively impacted them, or who are hindering their progress to self-determination, which includes self-representation. In Greenland and in parts of the Canadian North, the Inuit have made major strides toward increased levels of self-government, and they are working on improving their relationship dynamics between the national-state (Canada and Kingdom of Denmark) and their self-governing regions (the four regions of Inuit Nunangat in Canada) and state (Kalaallit Nunaat/Greenland) in various parts of the Arctic and sub-Arctic (for example, Loukacheva, Reference Loukacheva2012; Rodon, Reference Rodon, Pelaudeix and Basse2017; Shadian, Reference Shadian2010). While various Inuit regions work toward establishing and entrenching the structures they need to govern and protect their homelands and interests, there is awareness that their homelands are now geo-strategically positioned and an area of increased international interest (Telephone interview with Paul A, Quassa, former Premier of Nunavut, 26 October 2018).
Until the early 2000s, the fact that IENGOs are stigmatized in the North American North was a minor issue, since the Arctic and North were typically not a high priority for them. As the change in global environmental discussion shifted to include the Arctic and the North, so too did IENGO interest in involvement in the region:
I think that the idea of working on the environmental issues in the North is very attractive. It is very catchy. Also, it is very significant in environmental change and of significant impact. It is also an area where that pristine idea, the idea of a pristine environment is changing quickly so I think in a way it is an area where a lot of these ENGOs want to be working (Telephone interview with Nathan Cohen-Fournier, socio-economic development officer for the Makivik Cooperation, 23 January 2019).
Despite the rise in interest in Northern engagement, the stigma of IENGOs is persistent, because some organizations continue to repeat the same patterns of excluding local voices to pursue agendas they are interested in.
A good example of a contemporary IENGO effort to impact the region and people in a manner disconnected from local interests is the campaign in the 2010s by the IFAW (in coalition with Defenders of Wildlife, Eurogroup for Animals, Humane Society International, International Fund for Animal Welfare, Natural Resources Defense Council, ProWildlife, and the Species Survival Network) to get an international trade ban imposed on polar bear products through listing them as endangered with the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) (IFAW, 2010; CITES, n.d.). IFAW argued for a prohibition on polar bear hunting stating: “As many as 440 polar bears are slain each year in the name of profit … We at the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) are looking to put a stop to this pointless and wasteful practice” (National Geographic, 2013).
Inuit from Canada, the country with the highest population of polar bears, strongly oppose the listing of polar bears as endangered and an external imposition on their cultural practices and local economies through a prohibition on hunting and shipping of polar bear by-products (WWF, 2013). In the end, CITES has not listed the polar bear despite the efforts of IFAW. The IFAW called the outcome of the CITES refusal a “death knell for polar bears,” and the IFAW DC Director Jeff Flocken argued that the “CITES parties have turned their back on this iconic species” (IFAW, 2010).
Other organizations have been working in the North for decades and still find it difficult to avoid being lumped together with organizations like IFAW and Greenpeace and their respective legacies. For example, WWF has continuously worked on Arctic issues for close to 30 years, since it established the Global Arctic Program in 1992 (WWF, n.d.). One WWF representative, with years of experience working in the Arctic and with Inuit organizations and government actors, reflected that:
People often conflate all NGOs into animal rights groups, whether that is Greenpeace or PETA or others, and so they may not differentiate between us and other NGOs so we have to strive to differentiate what we are doing on our approaches and allow people to understand the differences between us and other groups. That means that you are starting with a lot of scepticism often when you are meeting people and that means that you really need to prove yourself and invest a lot into the relationship. You cannot take anything for granted (Telephone interview with WWF representative 2, 2018).
The stigma of IENGOs in the North American North is an issue if any external organization wants to engage in a credible way with Inuit and on Arctic and Northern issues in its advocacy.
There are practical reasons why IENGO stigma held by Inuit audiences matters for IENGOs wanting to work on Northern issues. Inuit people in Northern Canada and Greenland are both the local authorities (for example, governments, security, research authorities, for example, research license granting bodies and recording licenses for professional videos), and they are Indigenous people whom are legitimizing actors increasingly seen as mandatory for inclusion in all activities related to their homeland (for example, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, 2018; Nunavut Research Institute, 2015; United Nations, 2007). Either way, if an objective of an IENGO is to progress a political and advocacy agenda that includes work in, or which impacts on, the North, then the absence of local Indigenous input de-legitimatizes that work according to contemporary norms of northern engagement. Many potential audiences for the IENGO messages, such as the UN, Arctic Council, Arctic state governments, and academics, are unlikely to take the messaging or the messenger seriously if it excludes Indigenous voices.
Inuit are sensitive to external interest in them and their homelands as a result of the long legacy of colonial attitudes and actions (Loukacheva, Reference Loukacheva2012; Rodon, Reference Rodon, Pelaudeix and Basse2017; Shadian, Reference Shadian2010). The legacy of these actions includes experience with southern-based governments (Ottawa or Copenhagen) claiming ownership of their homelands, industry coming into their home and removing local resources for southern benefit without contributing positively to local economies (extractive mineral industries and the history of whale hunting), and advocacy organizations protesting to urban southern-based audiences for the protection of species. This last action, NGO protests for predominately southern-based urban audiences, is particularly important for this paper as the protests often occur with minimal understanding of Northern hunting practices and the cultural and economic links between local species and the people who live with them (for example, polar bears, seals, and whales) (Burke & Phelps Bondaroff, Reference Burke and Phelps Bondaroff2019; Phelps Bondaroff & Burke, Reference Phelps Bondaroff and Burke2014; Sale & Potapov, Reference Sale and Potapov2010).
For example, Phelps Bondaroff and Burke (Reference Phelps Bondaroff and Burke2014, p.176) state that “[f]or many years, little mention was made by activists or by the media of the specifics of the Inuit [seal] hunts. At the height of the anti-sealing movement in the mid-1970s, Inuit and First Nations communities were only beginning to assert traditional rights and claims, and their ability to counter the powerful messaging of the anti-sealing movement was limited.” Wenzel (Reference Wenzel1991, p.8) also note in work published toward the end of the anti-sealing movement that the perception was growing in the early 1990s that organizations still protesting the seal hunt had taken on “a self-ascribed moral imperative toward Inuit and other aboriginal people.” This role as a self-appointed moral authority by IENGOs has not gone down well with Indigenous audiences, and the legacy has aged poorly with Northern audiences.
Furthermore, the result of Inuit empowerment has been the explicit loss of status for externally based IENGOs in Arctic and Northern affairs, and increased independence for the Inuit people and their paths to express their voices. Link and Phelan (Reference Link and Phelan2001, p.371) note: “An almost immediate consequence of successful negative labeling and stereotyping is a general downward placement of a person [or group] in a status hierarchy.” The question remains, if you are an IENGO wanting to engage an audience that stigmatizes you, how do you overcome the stigma and establish some degree of legitimacy?
The answer to the abovementioned question lies in self-reflection on the extent to which the organization created the circumstances that resulted in the stigma; whether the organization can and is willing to make changes in light of how it caused or contributed to the stigma; whether it wants to prioritize overcoming the stigma and fostering moral legitimacy with the stigmatizing audience; whether the organization can make changes to address the stigma and how far it is willing to take those steps; and whether the organization can and is willing to commit to change to appeal to the stigmatizing audience, which might dissatisfy existing supporters.
Greenpeace and its stigmatised legacy in the North American North
For Greenpeace, the anti-sealing legacy looms large. While organizations like WWF deal with the IENGO stigma in the North, their lack of participation in much of the offending behavior connected to the anti-sealing movement makes it easier for them to distinguish themselves with locals. Greenpeace is not so lucky. Greenpeace helped lead the charge in protesting seal hunting and came to define international perceptions of the hunt through their innovative use of direct action image events (Phelps Bondaroff & Burke, Reference Phelps Bondaroff and Burke2014; Wenzel, Reference Wenzel1991). As a result, to this day, many people have a deep-seated hatred and distrust for Greenpeace in the North American North (Telephone interview conducted with Warren Bernauer, 7 January 2019).
Among audiences in the North American North, Greenpeace’s direct action image events created powerful imagery that typified the anti-sealing movement and precipitated the movement’s international success. These stunts, “based on its ingenious use of ‘guerrilla theatre’ to dramatize environmental destruction,” became Greenpeace’s trademark style (Shaiko, Reference Shaiko1993, p.97 as referenced by Carter, Reference Carter2007, p.152). Greenpeace, and other organizations, also “mailed countless appeals for funds, using photographs of Newfoundland and Labrador fishermen clubbing baby seals – images that could not fail to horrify a North American and European public unexposed to the processes that bring meat to its own tables” (Woods, Reference Woods1986, p.2). Furthermore, Greenpeace members blocked sealing vessels by standing on the ice in front of them, confronted sealers on dangerous ice pans, and arranging celebrity endorsements to get media coverage, such as Bridget Bardot (Phelps Bondaroff & Burke, Reference Phelps Bondaroff and Burke2014).
During its anti-sealing movement advocacy, Greenpeace’s stances and actions cultivated moral legitimacy with its support base, but failed to connect with sealers and sealing communities who were impacted by their stances and actions but who were also not the primary audience for it. Despite not being the primary audience, the stances and actions of Greenpeace, and other IENGOs like IFAW, failed to resonate locally because the work of these organizations lacked local grassroots credibility, cultural sensitivity, or awareness about the people and places being targeted. Paul A. Quassa, former Premier of Nunavut states:
I think in 2018, this is still a learning process for big corporations that voice their issues with the Arctic. If big organizations like WWF or Greenpeace are going to voice anything about the Arctic, they have to rely on these [local NGOs] to say it right. In the past, WWF, and big organizations like Greenpeace, they were just making statements at the international level that did not really make sense for the Arctic. I think that is changing with the use of [local] NGOs. That is vitally important for these international organizations to say it right. To say the truth because [local] NGOs represent people of the Arctic who know the Arctic, who live up here. If an international organization is going to make statements about the Arctic, then it is important that they sync with the reality of the North (Telephone interview with Paul A, Quassa, former Premier of Nunavut, 26 October 2018).
Previously, Greenpeace’s anti-nuclear protests saw the American government being the target of its ire with Greenpeace assuming the role of David against the US Government Goliath. In the subsequent anti-sealing movement, the roles were reversed with Greenpeace acting as Goliath against vulnerable local sealers and their rural communities (Phelps Bondaroff & Burke, Reference Phelps Bondaroff and Burke2014).
These actions have caused Greenpeace to be stigmatized by Northerners and synonymous with every negative idea they have about IENGOs. As was noted by a WWF representative who frequently works with northern communities and organizations, the Greenpeace anti-sealing legacy impacts all IENGOs hoping to engage in the North American North.
Greenpeace had a campaign against baby sealing, and it hurts the sealskin market worldwide, and it has never recovered … When people ask me, “who are you?” having never seen the WWF but recognizing the panda, I say, “listen we are not Greenpeace, and we have not destroyed the sealing in the Arctic. It is not our fault. We are helping you.” Still, people are very skeptical to international NGOs, and it is probably because of this sealskin campaign (Interview with WWF representative 1, 2018).
Audiences “routinely evaluate organizations on normative grounds based on an evaluation of the morality of their behavior. The moral judgments of an audience and, in particular, the issues on which it directs its moral concern are strongly shaped by that audience’s self-concept” (Hampel & Tracey, Reference Hampel and Tracey2019, p.13). Many Inuit remain sceptical of Greenpeace and its intentions and are still angry and unforgiving over its past (McCluskey, Reference McCluskey1998; Northern News Services, 1996).
Moral legitimacy is a “positive moral evaluation … An audience confers this judgment when it normatively approved of an organization, because the audience regards it as beneficial to society” (Hampel & Tracey, Reference Hampel and Tracey2019, p.13). Moral legitimacy is the form of legitimacy at the heart of Greenpeace’s work with moral messages and taking the moral high ground being major ways in which Greenpeace frames its agendas and fulfils its mandate (Carter, Reference Carter2007, p.154). So far, Greenpeace’s approach to the North American North has often failed to resonate.
Among Inuit audiences, there is a reluctance to believe Greenpeace attempts to vocalize contrition for the unintended spillover of the movement’s work on the livelihood of Indigenous Northerners. As one Greenpeace representative noted: “I do not believe that one single apology will fix the relationship. I believe apologies are needed, and reconciliation is needed, but we also need to show that we are a different organization today, and we have a higher level of respect for Indigenous rights and the need for development” (Interview conducted with a Greenpeace representative, 2016).
The organization’s path to self-reflection and change in its approach toward Northern audiences has been a difficult task for Greenpeace and is linked to the larger organizational process of internal professionalization, which began in the 1990s. Greenpeace’s internal professionalization process focuses on its adoption of a more “solutions-led strategy” with it “prepared to compromise its hostile attitude” in the pursuit of its objectives (Carter, Reference Carter2007, p.153).
Very early in the 1970s, Greenpeace leadership, namely Bob Hunter, recognized that Inuit were impacted by the anti-sealing movement, and Greenpeace contributed to this negative outcome and tried to help, but it was too late.
The leadership at the time had quite a diversion of opinion on the seal campaign. Once they had gone up to the north and met with some Inuit and started to understand the impact of their campaign, Bob Hunter and Paul Watson started to have a difference of opinion over this and that led, in a lot of ways, to the creation of Sea Sheppard. Paul Watson left the organization. Bob Hunter wanted to go, what he called “deep green”; less about animal rights and more about the notion of true ecology, which involves humans (Telephone interview with Jessica Wilson, member of Greenpeace, 30 October 2018).
As the organization grew and gained more experience campaigning in the 1980s–90s, it avoided approaching campaigns like it did the anti-sealing movement, which inverted the David versus Goliath imagery resulting in Greenpeace being perceived locally as the aggressor on weaker, local targets (Phelps Bondaroff and Burke, Reference Phelps Bondaroff and Burke2014).
Some other IENGOs have noticed how Greenpeace’s efforts at self-reflection have resulted in attempts to reach out to Northern audiences to actualize its internal changes into outward shifts in knowledge, philosophy, strategy, and tactics. One WWF representative noted that: “After Greenpeace ruined the sealing, they tried to mitigate their destruction, and they had campaigning for Inuit sealing. They really tried, and nobody is talking about their effort to undo the damage, but it did not succeed. It goes unmentioned, but I think it should be noted that they did try to do it but did not succeed” (Interview with WWF representative 1, 2018).
In fact, Greenpeace’s attempted to distance itself from the anti-fur campaign at the heart of the anti-sealing movement quite early. In spring 1986, Greenpeace responded to the appeal of the Indigenous Survival International (ISI) organization and WWF for it “to honor the commitment to aboriginal people that was part of Greenpeace’s founding philosophy” and end their involvement in the protests (Woods, Reference Woods1986, p.6). In response, “Greenpeace announced that it is withdrawing from the anti-fur campaign in recognition of the difficulties that an environmental organization faces in running head to head with native people’s organizations” (Woods, Reference Woods1986, p.6).
Despite formally withdrawing from the protests in 1986, a key reason why Greenpeace struggles so much with its attempts to get past the anti-sealing movement legacy is that it is saddled with stigma on behalf of a movement, not just its own contribution to this movement. This situation makes it hard to be accountable and make amends. Wilson, a Greenpeace member with over 11 years of experience including time at both in the Canadian office and at the international office, reflected that “Greenpeace never campaigned for the EU ban on seal products … and left the campaign before that happened. Other organizations, however, got involved. IFAW (International Federation for Animal Welfare), the Humane Society, and PETA were the main players there” (Telephone interview with Jessica Wilson, member of Greenpeace, 30 October 2018). Regardless of the technicality of how far Greenpeace may have actively pursued the sealing ban or continues to implicitly support it, in the North Greenpeace is synonymous with the anti-sealing movement, and the anti-sealing movement is synonymous with southern-based animal rights groups and IENGOs.
Members of the Greenpeace organization who work on Northern issues are aware that the organization’s efforts to establish itself as a rightful and legitimate actor in the North American North have had limited success to date. Wilson reflected that: “The burden of this big global brand is such that I think a lot of the campaigning work done by other organizations was sort of painted with the Greenpeace brush. The image for it for many people up north is that it is kind of all Greenpeace” (Telephone interview with Jessica Wilson, member of Greenpeace, 30 October 2018).
As the upcoming exploration of Greenpeace’s anti-oil drilling campaign in Greenland illustrates, efforts to overcome the past and amend its approach toward Arctic engagement came across as one step forward in its relations with northerners and two steps back by acting in a manner that seemed disconnected from local interests. It is a case of contrasting priorities with some localized members of Greenpeace recognizing the impediment of the organizational stigma on its ability to advance its Arctic/Northern agenda and the value of addressing the stigma, and other members of the leadership unwilling to be patient with local engagement and commit to the change needed to signal organization change to help overcome the stigma with local Inuit. International organizational goals and the avoidance of immediate costs the organization would incur by pursuing stigma reversal with Inuit audiences were prioritized.
Greenpeace and Nuuk, Greenland
Greenland has been looking for ways to fund its path toward independence and is looking to its natural resources as the key to realize this objective. In 2010, Greenpeace Nordic attempted to re-engage in Greenland, through its Danish office after not having been in the region since the 1980s (Wessendorf, Reference Wessendorf2011, p.27). Greenpeace wanted to run a campaign against Arctic drilling. In its first major attempt to re-engage Greenland in the 21st century, Greenpeace misread the mood of much of Greenlandic society with its anti-drilling campaign in 2010–11 and undermined its very modest gains in stigma reversal in Greenland in the process. The local engagement efforts were derailed by two overarching issues: (1) the prioritization of immediate broader organizational objectives over long-term interests of many Greenlanders and Greenpeace’s international and Nordic efforts to overcome its local stigma and (2) the perceived repetition of poor practices, namely, the omission of local consultation, interests, and involvement in the protests against offshore oil drilling in the Nuuk Fjord.
Nuuk, Greenland and Greenpeace – Attempting to overcome stigma
Greenland has not been receptive to Greenpeace. The Inuit of Greenland continue to deal with the fallout of the anti-sealing movement on their culture and economy, and when confronted with Greenpeace members, Greenlanders are not shy about communicating their displeasure. As one Arctic Council representative recounted on their time in Nuuk in 2011:
I will tell you a little story. So, there was the ministerial meeting in Nuuk, Greenland; A pretty small place and not easy to get to. Clearly, the Danes were prepared for a whole lot of ministers to appear, so security was pretty tight … Police services were there. It was not possible to just get off the plane in Nuuk and disappear in the crowd, because there was no crowd. So, there was word that Greenpeace was going to have their thing, some sort of meeting hall and such … and I guess at some point, they figured out they would not be able to do their banner thing, because the security was just too tight, and there are police officers on every corner, so they decided to demonstrate outside of the hotel where the ministers were staying with costumes and banners and quite a few police out front. So, they are demonstrating and school let out, and these teens and pre-teens 12, 13, 14, 15 year old kids took a look and saw that they were Greenpeace and proceeded to taunt them and throw rocks at them and essentially chase them away … [it] happened because of the perception of Greenpeace in an Inuit community (Interview with an Arctic Council representative, 2018).
It is within this context of a community where one received hostility even from children that Greenpeace entered in 2010–2011, and it was Jon Burgwald from Greenpeace Nordic’s Danish office that played a leading role in the engagement effort.
Reception to Burgwald was cold at first, but his individual persistence and professionalism were observed, and the opinions of some people started to shift slightly.
He was improving Greenpeace’s image in Greenland and was wearing sealskins. The first time he was in Greenland they threw eggs and stones at him, but the relationship was getting better and better. He was attacked by Sea Sheppard, because he had an interview about sustainability in Greenlandic sealing, and he was wearing a seal vest, and they had a campaign, “Fire Jon Burgwald of Greenpeace.” That was received pretty positively in Greenland, and they [relations] were improving (Interview with a WWF representative 1, 2018).
Burgwald’s work to signal a self-aware and evolving Greenpeace was interrupted when he was warned by Greenpeace representatives in the Netherlands to tone down the support for sealing and the organization progressed with its plans to protest Cairn Oil exploration without any clear local support. In fact, when Greenpeace held a public meeting in Nuuk, it was met by protestors against them rather than supporters, because “[c]ampaigns against the hunting of seals and whales on the part of Greenpeace and other animal rights organizations have resulted in quite serious mistrust of these organizations among the Inuit” (Wessendorf, Reference Wessendorf2011, p.27).
At the international level, Greenpeace’s campaigning against Greenlandic offshore development helped to shed light on Arctic drilling, and its risks, and symbolized the need to protect the pristineness of the Arctic (Interview with Mads Flarup Christienen of Greenpeace Nordic, 7 February 2019).
It was very much focused on the oil drillings and came on the back of the Deep Water Horizon incident [April 2010] that had happened just two months prior and the failure of the Copenhagen Climate Summit … We realized that instead of mainly talking about numbers and reduction schemes and stuff, that the general public did not really understand, which was too complex and not very hands on, we had to build another case that was visible. And, one of those cases, then we had the Deep Water Horizon accident, and then two months later, we had the oil drilling the first in a bit more than a decade happening in the Arctic offshore [in Greenland]. We tied that all in together to start a movement about oil drillings, but it was not until later in 2011 that our campaigns started to expand a bit more, become more clever were we looked more at the complexities of the Arctic region and started to build a cross Arctic strategy (Interview with Greenpeace representative, 2016).
Subsequent protests occurred at Cairn Oil headquarters in Edinburgh in 2011 to further drive home Greenpeace’s opposition to Arctic drilling (Milmo, Reference Milmo2011). Cairn ultimately decided that it did not find enough oil off Nuuk to warrant the continuation of its resource development at that time (Webb, Reference Webb2010).
Greenpeace’s actions against the Nuuk fjord oil exploration undermined its earlier progress to overcome its stigma. The result of the protests against Cairn Oil in Greenland left Greenpeace isolated in their stance as it “did not … obtain the support from Greenlanders that the organization might have hoped for when its supporters boarded the Cairn Energy drilling operations” (Wessendorf, Reference Wessendorf2011, p.27). In fact:
The Greenpeace people were very much against [oil drilling and saw it] as a threat against the Arctic environment and let themselves onto the drilling equipment and were arrested. It was noted by everyone in Nuuk that they were wearing seal skin mitts. We laughed at it. Everybody laughed at it. I think they miscalculated. They thought that they would be able to help rehabilitate themselves if they attacked the potential danger to the Arctic environment, but that [potential oil development] at the same time was the meal ticket for Greenland for potential independence. If they did strike oil, then Greenland would have an income, and I do not think they [Greenpeace] read that picture well (Telephone interview with a retired civil servant, 2019).
Greenpeace’s actions reinforced its status as morally illegitimate with local audiences, because they conveyed the message locally that “the organization’s activities as harmful for society” (Hampel & Tracey, Reference Hampel and Tracey2019, p.14). As a result, Greenpeace’s reputation “was back to 0 … in Greenland,” because locals perceived Greenpeace as prioritizing its international plans over their effort to re-engage Greenlanders (Interview with WWF representative 1, 2018).
At the same time, back in Europe, Greenpeace supporters took issue with Burgwald wearing a seal-skinned vest, which they saw as signaling pro-sealing support. The reality of operating an international organization like Greenpeace is that:
when you do a particular activity that has an impact on one country, it can go across the border and be perceived as controversial. This is what happened when my colleague Jon [Burgwald] wore that thing [the sealskin vest] and one [Dutch] journalist that did not really know of the whole history, which obviously a lot of people do not really know, right. Indigenous people know it and maybe some people that work there for the government, but a Dutch journalist there has no clue and thinks “What! They are in favor of fur!” … Those are the things that can cross over. Maybe in his context at the time it made sense in reaching out and the Indigenous people really appreciated it, but here people just do not know that context. They have no clue (Interview with Faiza Outahsen, 11 September 2018).
Burgwald’s public expression of support for Indigenous sealing by wearing a sealskin vest caused confusion among existing Greenpeace supporters, particularly in Germany and the Netherlands, and the organization had not anticipated this outcome (Interview with Faiza Outahsen, 11 September 2018).
The fact that supporters in these countries, especially the Netherlands, would be confused by Greenpeace Nordic’s support for Indigenous sealing and that Greenpeace International would take this confusion and concern seriously and attempt to minimize the appearance of supporting fur makes sense when you consider that Greenpeace International has its headquarters in Amsterdam (Chasek et al. Reference Chasek, Downie and Brown2014, p.86). Furthermore, the “Dutch have the highest membership per capita … 45% of Dutch adults claimed to be members of an environmental organization” (Carter, Reference Carter2007, p.144). A message of support for sealing is in contrast with the organization’s history and the signals being conveyed by other Arctic campaigners, such as Faiza Outahsen of Greenpeace Netherlands; a member of the Arctic 30 arrested in Russia in 2013 during Greenpeace’s anti-offshore drilling campaign (Walker, Reference Walker2013).
Outahsen’s Greenpeace profile to a Dutch audience states: “Boren naar olie op de Noordpool is zoiets als zeehondjes doodknupplen of giftig afval dumpen: vrijiwel iedereen vindt het vreselijk, maar toch gebeurt het” (Greenpeace Nederland, 2013), which she roughly translated to mean: “Drilling for Arctic oil is kind of like taking a bat and beating seals to death or dumping toxic waste. Almost everybody hates it, but still it happens” (Translation by Faisa Outahsen during an interview with Faiza Outahsen, 11 September 2018). Outahsen notes that “even though we are running the same campaigns and having the same positions, the difference per country can be quite significant” (Interview with Faiza Outahsen, 11 September 2018).
Reuber and Morgan-Thomas (Reference Reuber and Morgan-Thomas2019, p.50) note that “establishing conformance with, and challenges to, social values is problematic when audience values are heterogeneous as they are for companies operating internationally.” The same problems international companies face with appealing to heterogenous audiences also applies to international NGOs, like Greenpeace; it is a large organization that has a core set of messages per campaign and will adapt its emphasis, examples, and imagery to best resonate with different target audiences.
Internally, the legacy of sealing protests is tricky for Greenpeace to navigate. Wilson acknowledges that the “seal campaign for better or worse came to define us as an organization for many, many years” (Telephone interview with Jessica Wilson, member of Greenpeace, 30 October 2018). Mads Flarup Christensen of Greenpeace Nordic goes further stating: “We got things wrong in the 70s around the sealing issue where I think we did not have sufficient knowledge or grounding in those areas and communities to really be able to, as city people and some from other countries, go into areas and have a massive impact on local life” (Interview with Mads Flarup Christienen, 7 February 2019).
The reality is that Greenpeace cannot avoid the legacy of the anti-sealing campaign: it is both a triumph and a stigma-causing event simultaneously. It all depends on the audience. Rex Weyler, a co-founding member of Greenpeace International, stated in 2005 about the Canadian seal hunt, for example, that: “To claim to be looking after indigenous cultures with a massive commercial seal hunt is a pretense … Economic and cultural arguments do not appear to remotely justify the clubbing and skinning of infant seals in their nursery” (Weyler, Reference Weyler2005). Many current Greenpeace supporters are proud of the legacy helping to drastically reduce the sealing industry and want to protect the legacy.
The legacy also comes with the local perception that Greenpeace has a tendency to parachute members into areas with minimal local involvement. Contrary to the popular public perception, Greenpeace consulted with the Inuit Circumpolar Council (ICC) branch before operating its campaign, according to Christensen who had a leading role in the engagement effort.
For different reasons [Greenpeace Nordic consulted with ICC Greenland] because they both represent special rights and considerations around Indigenous people, they, of course, have a special right to choose their way of life, but also because they have been the entry points to address the other part of our history; the seal issue and the negative ways of feeling around the original ways of living in Greenland and interactions with Greenpeace (Interview with Mads Flarup Christienen, 7 February 2019).
Additional information on the extent of the consultation with ICC Greenland and the information and views exchanged are not available now from both sides at this time, but Greenpeace Nordic feels that appropriate consultation did happen.
Ultimately, Greenpeace’s efforts to start the process to overcome its stigma in Greenland in 2010–11 did not succeed. The organization was perceived as not fully supporting the work that Burgwald through Greenpeace Nordic was doing with regard to apologizing and supporting Greenlandic sealing culture. Greenpeace International conveyed the attitude that it had already decided what it was going to do about Cairn oil and was going to do it regardless of local interests that may have conflicted with the agenda. Without the ability to provide transparency about its consultation, the organization’s Nordic branch came across as hypocritical through pushing an agenda without local support and undermining Burgwald’s inroads. In the end, Greenpeace overall did not give local audiences time to trust its signals about their contrition for the past, and it lacked the ability to be transparent in its changes in its Indigenous engagement.
According to a retired academic, some people within Indigenous organizations have long recognized that Greenpeace can be a valuable ally, but it is hard to navigate the politically sensitive working relationship in the open.
You do need to work with the Greenpeace’s of the world … but the problem is finding a way to do it which will be politically acceptable back at home, particularly in the more remote communities … We have to do it behind closed doors. We have to have our shared meals in back street restaurants rather than front street ones. So, it is just trying to find ways to connect and work together that would not be political dynamite back home, and it would be rather a while for this to come about (Interview conducted with retired academic and former Arctic Council consultant, 2018).
Overall, the lack of concerted organizational commitment to change its approach toward the Greenlandic engagement, despite self-reflection and efforts led by Greenpeace Nordic’s Danish office, and its inability to provide transparency about local consultations undermined Greenland’s work to overcome its local stigma in Greenland.
Greenpeace and Clyde River, Nunavut
The people of Clyde River, Nunavut, Canada, spent six years in a battle to stop proposed seismic testing near the community (Rodon, Reference Rodon, Pelaudeix and Basse2017; Tasker, Reference Tasker2017). Seismic testing, which is also referred to as seismic airgun blasting, is “used to find oil and gas deep underneath the ocean floor. Airguns are so loud that they disturb, injure, or kill marine life, harm commercial fisheries, and disrupt coastal economies. These blasts are repeated every 10 s, 24 h a day, for days, and weeks at a time” (Oceana, n.d.). Clyde River was in a court battle with Canada’s National Energy Board (NEB) about its approval for seismic testing by a Norwegian consortium near the community. The NEB regulates “pipelines, energy development, and trade in the Canadian public interest” (National Energy Board, 2018).
After losing its case in the Court of Appeal, Clyde River took the NEB to the Supreme Court of Canada, with the financial and media campaign assistance of Greenpeace. On 26 July 2017, the Supreme Court of Canada upheld the community’s argument that the “proposed testing could negatively affect the treaty rights of the Inuit of Clyde River, who opposed the seismic testing, alleging that the duty to consult had not been fulfilled in relation to it” (Supreme Court Judgments, 2017).
Clyde River and Greenpeace: The Alliance
Greenpeace’s effort to open dialogue with the Inuit of Northern Canada started on 20 June 2014 when Greenpeace Canada issued an organizational apology to the Canadian Inuit for its past involvement in the anti-sealing movement (Kerr, Reference Kerr2014; Telephone interview with Jessica Wilson, 30 October 2018). This apology was part of a broader movement by Greenpeace Canada to demonstrate their contrition for its unintended impact on the livelihoods and culture of the Inuit people due to its past anti-sealing campaigning.
According to Warren Bernauer, an academic who worked to help Clyde River with its Supreme Court case (as well as another community – Qamani’tuaq/Baker Lake in its efforts against uranium mining) (Bernauer, Reference Bernauer2011), the level of hatred toward Greenpeace is high.
Because of Greenpeace’s role in the anti-sealing campaign in the 1980s, they are one of the most hated institutions in Nunavut. I really cannot emphasize this enough. Some people express more anger and resentment toward Greenpeace than they do toward the residential school system. It is because the anti-sealing campaign played that huge of a role in destroying Inuit culture … at the time in Nunavut that was the sole place to work. Once that was destroyed the land-based economic took such a hit. It was unbelievably tragic (Telephone interview conducted with Warren Bernauer, 7 January 2019).
The residential school system is symbolic of the worse of colonial attitudes and actions toward Indigenous people (Truth and Reconciliation Report, 2015), so when an organization is perceived as even worse than the residential school system, it is safe to say the organization is seen as morally illegitimate. This is the political landscape Greenpeace Canada ventured into in 2014.
Wilson was actively involved in Greenpeace Canada’s efforts to open dialogue with the Inuit. Regarding the apology, Wilson remembered that “the leadership of Greenpeace Canada and myself as the head of the Arctic campaign knew it was an absolutely fundamental first step. Greenpeace Canada had not operated in the Arctic in decades.” Wilson reflected that:
I do not think we can understate the depth of the hatred and resentment between Inuit and Greenpeace. For me, I am of Indigenous descent, I have Mohawk family, and I was going through this internal process of decolonization within my family while at the same time pursuing this internal process decolonization and honest reflection organizationally. It was a face of mirrors in my life, and it was difficult for me to show up in these communities and essentially feel like I was representing the colonizer (Telephone interview with Jessica Wilson, 30 October 2018).
While Greenpeace as an organization brought the apology, the emotional intelligence and the personal and professional experience of representatives, like Wilson, were vital to humanizing the beginning of Greenpeace’s process of reconciliation.
Kohn’s work on trust helps to explain why the involvement of an individual such as Wilson would be so profoundly important to providing the possibility for dialogue between Greenpeace and Canadian Inuit communities. As Kohn explains:
The more one feels one has in common with someone, the more confident one is likely to be about their behavior. Indications of shared social and cultural experience would have added to the empirical confidence … developed by observing the ways in which their opposite numbers avoided doing them harm (Kohn, Reference Kohn2008, p.34).
With her own experiences as a woman of Aboriginal descent proactively working through Canada’s colonial legacy and its impacts on her own family, Wilson has a different frame of reference than many Greenpeace activists of the past. Her involvement infuses a sincerity and commitment to change seen to be lacking in past apologies and effort to engage local audiences.
Running parallel to the Greenpeace’s signaling to Inuit in Canada was the local battle of Clyde River. Bernauer started working with Clyde River’s Mayor Natanine in 2012 when the community’s appeal to overturn the NEB approval of seismic testing was being reviewed (Bernauer, Reference Bernauer2014). By 2014, the NEB had ruled in favor of the seismic testing leaving Clyde River with only 30 days to appeal (National Energy Board, 2013). The community’s assessment of its needs and its planning for its path forward against the NEB created a window of opportunity for Greenpeace.
Bernauer remembers that Mayor Natanine “worked really hard to get different groups on Baffin Island to oppose the project, like the Clyde River Municipal Government, the Hunters and Trappers organization, the Baffin Mayor’s forum, the Qikiqtani Inuit Association [and others] … He approached a lot of different groups to sign off opposing this thing,” but other organizations outside of the immediate community area would not help, Inuit or, otherwise, at that time (Telephone interview conducted with Warren Bernauer, 7 January 2019). When asked why other organizations would not help Clyde River, Mayor Natanine felt that: “At the time, it did not look like we could win. I did not know this when it was happening, but afterward, I started hearing things about why and it was that nobody thought we could win. That was the only reason.” It is here that a notable change in Greenpeace’s self-awareness about how it should approach the Canadian Arctic begins to emerge.
The first step for Mayor Natanine before approaching Greenpeace, once he decided it was a step his community should consider, was to talk with his family and determine whether getting involved with Greenpeace was really the best thing for his community, family, and himself. This discussion was infused with the organization’s moral legitimacy deficit issues and negative stigma among locals.
At the time I did not want to [reach out to Greenpeace], because they were the enemy, and I went to my father … Luckily, when I asked him, he said in the 1970s, they did some seismic work with dynamite. It was not too intensive, but they did quite a bit of work with dynamite over on the coast, and he said that seals became deaf, their ears were bleeding, and puss coming out when they could catch them. And, he told me that I have to do everything to try and stop this, because it is going to destroy seals and whales and the ocean (Telephone interview with Jerry Natanine, 19 December 2018).
With his family’s support, and having come to terms with his own feelings toward Greenpeace, Mayor Natanine reached out to Greenpeace (Telephone interview with Jerry Natanine, 19 December 2018).
It is here that Greenpeace’s apology and its patience laid the groundwork to start the process to potentially overcome its stigma. It needed an opportunity to demonstrate that it could be better than it has been in the past. The apology and the contact information provided an opening for engagement and Mayor Natanine used it. Before any alliance was formed, however, community and local stakeholders and actors were consulted by the mayor, and consensus was reached about proceeding forward with Greenpeace: “we [the Hamlet Council] were working very closely with local hunters and trappers … After I talked with my father … I approached these organizations to see if they also agreed for me to approach Greenpeace as the mayor … For the board members at the time, it was quite emotional and very hard to deal with” (Telephone interview with Jerry Natanine, 19 December 2018).
The alliance had important features, which differed from past Greenpeace work in the North. The fact that Greenpeace agreed to the terms illustrates its self-awareness of how fragile its position is with Inuit and in the North and the changes it needs to make in order to foster local trust and demonstrate a new direction for its Arctic engagement. First and foremost, rather than coming into the community and telling them about what should be done about the NEB case and taking charge and running a campaign, the community and the organization negotiated their relationship; the community was in the lead, and Greenpeace had a supporting role.
While this may not be a practical way for Greenpeace to approach every alliance with Inuit people, given the very specific legal nature of this campaign and the community being the plaintiff in the court appeal, the community had to be in charge. Furthermore, Clyde River’s requirement that they would be the leader in the alliance also underscores the limited trust Greenpeace has with Inuit people.
Second, Greenpeace only undertook fundraising with the expressed permission of Clyde River, which helped to address concerns that the organization was using the community to make money. Mayor Natanine stated that “we were talking about fundraising and that was one of the hot topics with people having concerns that Greenpeace was just trying to make money off of us … I told them, ‘go make all the money that you can from us, because none of these other organizations wanted to help because of money, so fundraise like hell!’” (Telephone interview with Jerry Natanine, 19 December 2018).
The nature of the alliance was founded on the principle that no action in the case against the NEB or the consortium would be done by Greenpeace without the community’s final say on plans and their implementation. For their part, the community was pleased with the arrangement.
There was the money and other things, like the network they have with the membership they have, and it really worked out well for media purposes. They handled all our media, all our lawyer [coordination and] … money, but it was a really good relationship, because before they put out anything in regard to our case and in regard to our relationship, we always had the last word here in Clyde River; if we liked it or not (Telephone interview with Jerry Natanine, 19 December 2018).
Furthermore, people from Greenpeace did local engagement beyond the first step of the open apology.
Representatives from Greenpeace came to the community, and they participated in cultural activities, such as observing a traditional whale harvest, and took the time to learn about the people impacted by their past anti-sealing work and whose community environment was at risk from the seismic testing plan. Greenpeace brought their vessel Arctic Sunrise to the community too, and took time to teach locals about direct action techniques and its activism and image events to prepare the community in case they did not win their court appeal. This engagement signaled to both sides that there was a clear effort by both parties in the alliance to interact and learn from one another: “Their ship came up, the Arctic Sunrise, and three of us rode on that ship, and we went up and had cook-outs cooking seal meat and polar bear meat and whatnot, and they all ate with us, and we had great picnics and this and that happened” (Telephone interview with Jerry Natanine, 19 December 2018).
The successful working relationship indicated that the wider Greenpeace organization is learning. Its conduct demonstrates a willingness to develop a stronger understanding of the cultural impact of its past actions and the need to take actions (for example, support Inuit sealing and whaling; open consultation processes) in order for its Arctic engagement to have positive traction locally and help counter the decades of dislike felt toward them.
In Baker Lake, another Inuit community in Nunavut, Canada, Bernauer noted that in his time observing the final public hearing for a proposed uranium mine that “there was one elder who stood up to give their comments before the EA (environmental assessment) board, and he was threatening to get Greenpeace involved in the uranium mine issue, if the mining was approved” (Telephone interview conducted with Warren Bernauer, 7 January 2019). Bernauer believes that there has been a tentative change with some people, at least in Clyde River and Baker Lake, about Greenpeace, though this is fragile, and there are many that still want them to stay out of the Arctic (Telephone interview conducted with Warren Bernauer, 7 January 2019). As such, the issue of Greenpeace’s international objectives versus regional objectives remains a point of contention. How Greenpeace proceeds with its Northern engagement attempts while balancing its international objectives and membership/donor opinions will have a lot to do with how successful it is in the long term in overcoming its stigma in the North American North.
Conclusion
The legacy of the anti-sealing movement and general impression of IENGOs being colonial and idealistic in their approach to the North undermines contemporary IENGO engagement efforts. Furthermore, Inuit in the North American North have a growing range of home-grown outlets to voice their interests, desires, and demands without needing/wanting third-party actors acting as self-appointing conduits of local interests on the international stage. The effort of the IFAW and its allies to list polar bears as endangered with CITES and prohibit hunting is a prime example of continued IENGO campaigning which embodies this colonial spirit by being disconnected from local knowledge and interests and predicated on a misunderstanding about the rights of northerners.
That said, partnerships with IENGOs can sometimes be valuable and add new resources and expertise that some local actors lack or need in a specific circumstance. The work of Greenpeace Canada in supporting Clyde River is a good example of a case-specific partnership that worked well for both the IENGO and local community. There is ground for IENGOs to engage in a productive manner, but stigma looms in the North, and it is incumbent upon individual IENGOs wanting to be involved in Northern and Arctic issues to consider whether they can, want, and will take steps to address the stigma.
The example of Greenpeace Nordic’s engagement in Nuuk demonstrates how internal conflict over organizational priorities at the international level can undermine the long-term efforts to address local stigma. The problem of addressing stigma was compounded for Greenpeace Nordic through its inability to consistently demonstrate organizational contrition for the anti-sealing legacy and acknowledgement of Inuit priorities and interests in Greenpeace International’s wider “Save the Arctic” campaign, which included protests against exploration in the Nuuk fjord.
Greenpeace Canada’s work with Clyde River demonstrates the necessity of explicit local support for IENGOs in cases where the stigma is so severe that any action is circumspect. It also illustrates the way in which local leadership and pre-negotiated roles help guide an alliance and foster trust between the actors. In the case of Greenpeace Canada, for its initial foyer into stigma reversal in the Northern Canada to take root then commitment to this path of changed attitudes and actions must be demonstrated, because locals will be watching for indications of a slip back into destructive old habits.
