Thursday, August 29, 2013

The Small Party : North America's first and most radical 'green' Party

I seem to recall meeting Elizabeth May in the summer of 1979 at an environmental fair on Halifax's Garrison Grounds just after the 1979 federal election.

She was nonplussed by the total lack of reference to any environmental issue in the election from any party and talked about forming some sort of party that would.

A few months later she did just that : THE small PARTY ran almost a dozen candidates - all but two in the Maritimes, Elizabeth among them.

I was still an NDPer (democratic socialist) then but rapidly becoming disillusioned.

I catch the allusion to "Small is Beautiful" and heartily agreed: I wanted Nova Scotia to cede from Canada and go its small way alone.

Still do.

Seeing how all the huge mega-corporations and vaulting political empires have happily co-opted the word "green" , I wonder now if the move to the Green Party label was the right one.

It doesn't seem offensive enough now, as a name.

Rupert Murdoch can see himself saying he is pro-green but never saying that he is pro-smallness.

He'd rather kill himself first.

Maybe "The small Party" label needs to be brought back out of cold storage and ran past the Nova Scotia voters once again.....






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