State failure, or formation? Regulating mass destruction in BC, from the 1858 Gold Rush to the 2014 Mount Polley Mine Disaster (and beyond)

Neil Nunn is an environmental justice, law, and planning scholar whose research examines large-scale social and ecological disruption within British Columbia’s settler colonial era. Neil’s postdoctoral research is an exploration of the Fisheries Act in the context of the diitiida/the Jordan River Watershed on South Vancouver Island. diitiida/the Jordan River Watershed was once among the most abundant salmon-supporting ecosystems on southern Vancouver Island and the traditional territory of the Pacheedaht and Ditidaht Nation. Due to a century of reckless and historic and ongoing industrial practices this aquatic ecosystem has been rendered nearly lifeless. To help envision relations where life can once again flourish, Neil’s research considers how the Fisheries Act—widely considered the most powerful and sweeping for of environmental legislation in Canada, with a mandate, to protect fish and fish habitat—has not only allowed for the mass disruption of a once abundant ecosystem but has been an active participant in facilitating it.

Neil completed a PhD from the University of Toronto's Department of Geography and Planning. His doctoral research took the 2014 Mount Polley Mine disaster, the largest of its kind in Canadian history, as an entry point to consider how the disaster is relationally connected with broader patterns of socioecological disruption in the context of British Columbia’s colonial history. Neil is currently working on a book project that builds on this PhD research currently under contract with UBC Press.