Tag: governance

This piece shows how Brenda’s “capitalism vs fascism vs democratic socialism” post quietly rewrites Protect NL’s story. This article acknowledges the real rural harm—service cuts, depopulation, and green megaprojects on Crown land—but argues NL already lives in a strong state–corporate system, not pure capitalism. “Democratic socialism,” Norway/Iceland myths, and SDG talk become its soft front, selling more state power while leaving the underlying structure untouched. In the end, the article argues the real question isn’t which label we choose, but whether communities gain actual tools—local veto power, transparency, and independent citizen institutions—to push back against that fused system. Read More...

Companion to the “Nothing To Do With Land” series (especially Part 5: The Next Comfort Line – From Programs to Property). This piece uses a joint press release from Three Rivers Mi’kmaq Band and Benoit First Nation as Exhibit A that the “nothing to do with land” story is over. It shows how language about programs, reconciliation, and representation is now being cashed in as a claim to governing authority, unceded territory, and control over consultation through UNDRIP and FPIC. The article argues that once this shift is out in the open, locals need to see how every “programs not property” road quietly ends at the map. Read More...

Part 5 — the final part of this series — traces how comfort language—“healing,” “food security,” and “water protection”—systematically converts participation into jurisdiction. Benevolent programs build dependency through funding and metrics, normalize “stewardship,” and quietly shift land from public/private ownership into managed territory aligned with UNDRIP/SDG/30×30 objectives. The activist-to-manager pipeline turns protest into administration; the rhetorical arc from “nothing to do with land” to “we already have a land base” completes as the boundaries discussed in Part 4 evolve into rules, protocols, and conditional access. Funding and reporting then lock the regime in place, making the final pivot from programs to property feel like moral common sense. Read More...

This article investigates how a little-known Newfoundland regulation—NLR 29/24—was quietly drafted in response to Tent City protests, then used against a 2024 fishing boat demonstration. It traces how moral protest over homelessness, food insecurity, and water rights was absorbed into administrative procedure and regulatory enforcement. Drawing on academic insights from Guo and Hogan, it reveals how Newfoundland’s dependency-driven governance system reframes dissent as a deliverable, and how both Left and Right use the same bureaucratic machinery to suppress public disruption. Ultimately, it argues that protest in Newfoundland is not silenced—it is funded, formatted, and contained. Read More...

This article examines how political extremes have become the “new normal” in Newfoundland and Labrador, tracing their roots to fiscal bailout politics, the cod fishery collapse, and decades of boom–bust resource cycles. Economist Xinli Guo shows how soft budget constraints normalize fiscal brinkmanship, while Jessica Hogan’s comprehensive research links memories of the cod collapse, hydro megaproject overruns, mining bankruptcies, and offshore oil volatility to a cultural mindset of “sceptical optimism.” Combined with entrenched patronage politics and weak local institutions, these forces recast consensus as compliance and dissent as disloyalty, leaving communities trapped in cycles of hope and betrayal. The article argues that extremes are not random outbursts but systemic outcomes of Newfoundland’s political economy, and that naming this “unhinged” playbook is the first step toward restoring trust in moderation. Read More...