Rethinking Lifestyle

Wherever we humans live together we inevitably make and accept rules that govern how we relate to one another. Such rules are necessary. Some are very simple and have little bearing on how we live and relate to one another. An example is the rule that we drive on the right hand side of the street. Provided we all agree on which side of the road we should drive on, this rule affects little else.

But not all of the rules we accept as “normal” are as innocuous as that. Consider, the Dominion Lands Act that came into effect shortly after the treaties had been negotiated with the prairie aboriginals. According to this act a person could get 160 acres for a nominal price, and once he had achieved specified basic improvements to that quarter section, he was eligible to add an additional quarter also at a nominal price. In essence the government was freely giving farm land to individuals and families. This was a policy enacted to specifically attract farmers who were interested in owning, managing and operating their own farm. Financiers were also attracted by land now available in western Canada. Two that we know something about are W.P Davidson who acquired a “100,000 acres” in the Marchand area, and John Lowe who acquired 16 square miles in the Lowe Farm area. Both Davidson and Lowe made significant contributions to the development of the Marchand and Lowe Farm communities, but they came in spite of the policy, not because of the policy.

Attracted by the policy were Irish farmers who had narrowly escaped starvation in the Irish potatoe famine, Ukrainian peasant farmers who had not been able to gain the independence they sought in the feudal system of that time in Russia, and Mennonites increasingly uncomfortable with their relationship with the Russian government. And of course there were many others, but what they all had in common was that they were prepared to do most of the work needed to prosper their newly acquired farms. And these hard working families built communities. Attracted to these communities were merchants; Mama Papa types, not chains. These merchants, in addition to buying and selling, offered credit when things got rough, as they did for these pioneer families.

How would western Canada have developed had government decision makers not had this vision for prairie development? How would western Canada have developed had the land ownership been dominated by financiers each developing their own relationship with the labouring families needed to do the hard work?

I think of this these days when I observe the move towards farm consolidation. Much of this consolidation is the result of greater efficiency with bigger tractors and bigger machines, but there is also a move away from a situation where the owner is also the manager and does most of the work. Now-a-days much of the work is done by employees. What are the untended consequences of this shift?One is the decimation of communities like Randolph and Giroux. But there are many other unintended consequences.

This trend is not limited to farming. The same trend applies to where we buy our groceries and our hardware. Is this good? When we think of what is really important, is this getting us that? Our current rules that govern how we live together encourage consolidation of everything. But we could change the rules – if that is what we wanted to do. What would a Homestead Act for the 21st century look like?