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EDUCATION AND
RURAL DEVELOPMENT IN ALASKA
The Collected Essays of Patrick J. Dubbs
Decolonizing Economics
© Patrick J. Dubbs
While an adequate, comprehensive economic history of rural Alaska
has yet to be written, especially one from the perspective of rural
Alaskans, there appear to be several obvious trends that such a
history would focus on. In this brief paper, which is really more
bits and pieces of some other papers I have presented over the
past few years related to local level development in rural Alaska
than it is a fresh, new look at the rural Alaska economy, I will
briefly describe and examine these trends which, in combination,
I feel constitute what might be labeled a "colonized economy" and
I will then suggest an alternative to or modification of the existing
economic system which I feel will more directly benefit local rural
residents. The use of "I" here is a deliberate one for
historical data, like most if not all other data, are subject to
a variety of interpretations and the one I make in this paper will
pose some difficulties for the assimilationists and frontiersmen
among us.
Where does one start on such a formidable undertaking? I , like
Anders (1983), Berger (1985) and others dealing with the rural
Arctic, have increasingly found it productive to conceptualize
rural Alaska as a Fourth World context for this conceptualization
forces us to look at the nature of historical interrelationships
which give definition to the contemporary situation. In brief,
the Fourth World is a world different from the precontact tribal
world— it is a world created and maintained by a particular
set of historical relationships between two distinct populations—an
invading and/or settled colonizing industrial state population
and a resident indigenous or tribal population still occupying
its traditional land base. These relationships are initiated within
a traditional economically-driven colonization framework and are
perpetuated by an internal colonization dynamic through which the
indigenous population "...generally inhabit[s] marginal geographic
regions relative to central metropolitan areas, and...[whose] resources
have historically exploited by the dominant group without local
consultation (O’Neil: 119-120)" and eventually, the indigenous
group loses its "...sovereignty and [becomes] subordinate
to the wider society and state over which...[it does not] exercise
any control (Stavenhagen: 4)".
The Fourth World construct describes the all too familiar "colonized
economy" in which three processes—exploitation, dependence
and dominance—characterizes the interrelationships or exchanges
between the rural tribal population and the larger external system.
It is an unidirectional power/reward situation in which decisions
are initiated by, implemented under the direction of, and intended
to benefit the external dominant system. This is not to say that
there are no "benefits" accruing to the resident tribal
population, indeed it is the illusion or reality of local benefits
that props up this system, but that these "beneficial" outcomes
were not intended to be primary outcomes. For example, there is
probably no one in this room who seriously believes that the primary
outcome of ANCSA was to be the settlement of long standing and
legitimate Alaska Native legal claims to their traditional land
base as opposed to it being the vehicle by which the North Slope
oil wealth became easily accessible to multinational corporations,
Alaska’s entrepreneurial community, the State of Alaska and
the Federal Government.
Does this construct fit the rural Alaskan economic history? I
think it does. A glance at the colonial economic history of rural
Alaska reveals a consistent pattern of externally-generated natural
resource extraction and exportation with little to no regard for
the long-term welfare or development of the local resource producing
regions. Rural Alaska is simply a resource bank to be drawn upon
when external needs are great and/or profit possibilities are large.
While the apparent strategy of extracting as many resources as
possible as cheaply as possible may make good economic sense in
terms of maximizing returns and minimizing costs, it clearly is
an exploitative strategy when the maximization is geared to external
entities and the minimization to local entities. It is a system
of withdrawals, not deposits.
The component in this "colonized economy" constellation—economic
dependence—is an undeniable one in rural Alaska. The alluring
tentacles of different and sometimes more efficient goods quickly
entwined rural residents and rather quickly, led to alterations
in economic values, changes in seasonal pursuits, and formations
of new residential patterns so that cash or goods could be obtained
to fulfill these new needs. One saw the encouragement of individualistic
economic gain as opposed to cooperative economic endeavors; the
acceptance of diffuse corporate or entrepreneurial structures dictating
both the time and place of work as opposed to following seasonal
cycles; reliance upon highly efficient, imported technology as
opposed to the ecologically sounder but less reliable and productive
local technology; population relocation and centralization in sites
of external production activities rather than in locations related
to traditional ecological niches and, most importantly, an emphasis
on the pursuit of cash generating and external market oriented
activities over local subsistence activities.
The dominance feature directly relates to dependence as well as
to decision-making. Dominance, on the one hand, is the other side
of dependence. By relying upon external markets to purchase local
resources, labor and provide goods, local residents were dominated
by these external institutions in the sense of not being in control
of them, or even being integral to their operation. External shifts
in demand conditioned internal activities in rural Alaska rather
than vice-versa. The other aspect of dominance, the decision-making
aspect, again puts power and authority over local resources increasingly
in the hands of external bodies or authorities, a phenomenon quite
consistent with the historic rhythm of United States Indian policy
(Price 1979). The proliferation of externally generated boards,
agencies, commissions and the like, each with their nominal local
rural representative, in many ways have become the definers of
the future of rural Alaska.
About this time, the assimilationists and frontiersmen among us
are no doubt saying something like "So what? That’s the
nature of progress in the modern world and our Alaskan economy
depends on these exports. No one’s twisting anyone’s
arm. Besides, them Alaska Natives got all those corporations and
are better off than you and me." There is obviously some truth
to this type of support for a "colonized economy", it
is just that the "truth" usually comes from the perspective
of those who are outside the resource producing areas but who benefit
most from them; in the Alaskan context, these are the residents
and corporations, including the several ANCSA regional corporations,
found in the more urbanized area of central and southeast Alaska.
However, one might ask "what about the village residents whose
livelihoods have become dependent upon increasingly unstable sources
of cash and inaccessible natural resources in today’s mixed
economy and who have become entangled in a web of external social,
cultural, political, economic and technological systems? How do
these folks feel about this export-oriented, colonial economy?" I
am not sure and I do not think anyone else is sure what the response
to this question would be in rural Alaska today. Six or seven years
ago, I think you would have found a lot of support for the colonial
economy throughout rural Alaska. After the Berger hearings, perhaps
the only true indicator of rural resident responses to the post-ANCSA
world, the rather precipitous decline in local governmental revenues
due to the external oil glut, and the recent, widespread publicity
generated by the disturbing Anchorage Daily News "People In
Peril" series, I think today you will find a more reflective
rural Alaska. My guess is that responses will vary with the size,
location, and particular cultural and economic orientations of
the community as well as its ability to consider and/or pursue
alternatives to the existing colonial economy. Outside of the regional
institutional centers, which I think form a fundamentally different
pattern of rural development, I would expect most smaller, land-based
communities to be quite concerned about their long term future
in the colonial economic context. It is no accident that the such
recent phenomena as the Berger Report, the Yupiit Nation, the Alaska
Native Coalition, the Alaska Resource Commodities Trading and Investment
Corporation and the Inupiaq Spirit Movement all seem to resonate
more loudly with residents of smaller communities.
But, is there really any alternative to the existing colonial
economy? Obviously, I think there is, but it is an alternative
that will not be suitable for or desired by all rural Alaskan communities.
It is an alternative pattern of development advocated by the "Another
Development" school of thought for which
Development is a whole. Its ecological, cultural, social, economic,
institutional and political dimensions can only be understood
in their systematic interrelationships, and action in its service
must be integrated...the three pillars, so to speak, of Another
Development [are—it is]
- Geared to the satisfaction of needs, beginning with the
eradication of poverty.
- Endogenous and self-reliant, that is, relying on the strength
the societies which undertake it.
- In harmony with the environment...Another Development requires
structural transformations (Dag Hammarskjold Foundation 1975:28).
Such development
"...relies on what a human group has: its natural environment,
its cultural heritage, the creativity of the men and women who
constitute it, becoming richer through exchange between them
and with other groups. It entails the autonomous definition of
development styles and of lifestyles (Dag Hammarskjold Foundation:34).
"Another Development" does not deny the import of traditional
economic goals such as economic growth, infrastructure expansion,
cash generation, etc., it simply views these as one of many possible
means to attain need satisfaction as opposed to being the exclusive
subject or goal of development.
Utilization of local resources in locally decided ways for locally
determined ends becomes the path to self-reliant and sustainable
development. Again, "Another Development" does not deny
the fact that there may be a need for exchange linkages with other
systems, it simply does not accept, a priori, that you must have
such linkages. Should such linkages be required, it does suggest
that they be initiated and controlled by local communities as much
as possible.
By stressing harmony with the environment, "Another Development" goes
beyond the mere physical environment to embrace the total physiosocial
environment. Questions of compatibility, appropriateness, resource
utilization, exhaustion and renewability and the like are part
and parcel of fitting activities into the local environment rather
than changing the environment to fit into activities as is so often
the case under colonized economies.
In contrast to externally oriented colonized economies, "Another
Development" occurs
"...when people and their communities—whatever the
space and time-span of their efforts—act as subjects and
are not acted upon as objects; assert their autonomy, self-reliance
and self-confidence; when they set out and carry out projects.
To develop is to be, or to become. Not to have. (Third System
Project: 72)."
Is an "Another Development" strategy a feasible one
for rural Alaska communities? Again, I obviously think that it
is. However, for it to be successful, several features have to
be in place, the most important of which is that a locally-controlled
subsistence-centered system be given strategic and unassailable
legal primacy so that it can provide an enduring basis of physical
and psychocultural sustenance for residents of small communities.
With this foundation, rural communities can and should embark upon
a wide-variety of local and extra-local cash extending and generating
activities. To be sure, these types of activities such as tourism,
enclave employment and the sale of natural resource products involve
trade-offs between autonomy and external dependency, but they also
are activities that are initiated from, implemented by and intended
to benefit the local community as opposed to the external colonizing
system. Through this approach, one becomes a selective participant
in the colonized economy rather than subservient to it.
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