People for the West

People who make their living by mining in the United States have perhaps found the past year or so a little more congenial than in the preceding decade. From the repeal of some of the measures in the Department of Interior’s Surface Management Regulations to the reopening of more land to exploration, the regulatory environment in the western states is much less stifling.

The industry may see this as reflecting on the new federal administration, which has not been as determinedly anti-development as the Clinton government. Centrally, Interior Secretary Gale Norton compares well to the blinkered Bruce Babbitt, whose anti-mining views were worn on his sleeve, possibly to keep them handy whenever he needed to shove them down westerners’ throats.

The danger in depending on the good sense of federal officials, especially elected ones, to ensure that the mining industry has access to public lands is that solutions to land issues may be seen as something imposed by an ideologically driven government back in D.C., rather than a sensible compromise between competing public interests.

There is always a tremendous appetite for stories that portray governments, especially identifiably pro-business, Republican ones, as the tools of private commercial interests. Anti-mining groups can be counted on to spin every setback to preservationist ideology exactly that way; the mainstream media, to see those events through the prism activist groups put before their eyes. That could mean a backlash, one that could be played out through state politics and the courts just as much as through federal politics.

There is another way: that of making mining such a part of public life that it is seen by ordinary people as a natural and essential component of the economic and social landscape. Doing that, though, means speaking truth to dogma, which is not something done easily or safely.

A willingness to confront anti-mining propaganda can be refreshing. Too many lies and too many fairytales go unchallenged by industry. The look of panic on the faces of the protestors when confronted with fact can be worth the effort on its own; the more important result is an audience that will remember seeing the activists shown up as manipulators, and will next time withhold its trust.

Another promising line of effort is in image-building: when mining companies and mining people are seen as contributors to the community, it becomes harder for activists to paint them as soulless corporate despoilers.

To take one example: does anyone with personal knowledge of the management of Sutton Resources imagine those people capable of burying Tanzanian gold miners to get them out of the way? When the public looks at mining people and sees a seamless cloth of integrity, it will find it harder to buy caricatures and (in the extreme case) libels.

Last, there is the old chestnut of public education. That is a long-term project: given the success of the educational system in providing today’s young with basic intellectual skills, it has to be seen as a life’s work or two. But it can’t be abandoned, because the ideologues will not give up that ground. Johnny may not be able to read, but he knows digging holes in the ground is bad. Getting that picture of mining out of the schoolbooks is partly a political struggle, but it also means winning over the minds of educators.

Having an administration in Washington that can see beyond its electoral nose is a good thing, no doubt. But it is not enough to have people in office who think like “we” do; they will not be there forever. Victory will be a whole lot more durable when the public sees a mine as an asset and not a threat to their standard of living and quality of life.