107 pages. A thesis presented to the Department of Political Science and the Clark Honors College of the University of Oregon in partial fulfillment of the requirements for degree of Bachelor of Arts, Spring 2016.One of the key debates within American environmentalism over the past forty
years has been over its applicability beyond our cultural context. Its staunchest critics
find that many of its precepts (most notably the wilderness concept at its heart) are
founded on ethnocentric, indeed perhaps colonialist, suppositions. Its proponents
however argue that there is an overriding truth to this, one that transcends the need for
moral agreement and cultural respect.
This thesis examines one case in which the precepts of American
environmental thought were put to the test: the Makah Native American tribe's struggle
for whaling rights. In this concept the Makah's ancient tradition of whaling came up
against heated opposition from environmentalist critics, many of whom argued that
whaling would harm the integrity of the ecosystem and of the whaling stocks, and that
therefore the tradition should not be revived. This thesis will argue that ultimately this
conflict shows the extent to which American environmentalism relies on ethnocentric
presuppositions (including but not limited to the wilderness concept) to make its claims,
and that therefore it requires a new path
