A study of rural organizations in southeastern Saskatchewan has found a strong spirit of independence.
However, that drive for autonomy may be harming their chance to be stronger by working in partnerships, said Jonathan Anuik, a PhD candidate in the University of Saskatchewan’s history department.
Anuik and fellow researcher Heather Williamson, a psychology student, outlined their findings from recent interviews with 10 groups in the Qu’Appelle Valley during a Saskatoon presentation organized by the Centre for the Study of Co-operatives.
The groups were all part of the social economy, which Anuik and Williamson defined as a third sector between private enterprise and government, including co-operatives, nonprofit groups and community based organizations.
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“There is a lot of resistance to partnership; it’s seen as government,” Anuik said.
“People are content being individual enterprises even if there is a potential to work together more.”
Several of the groups studied were aboriginal, which led one audience member at the Feb. 26 presentation to wonder whether there was a race element in the divide.
Reserve residents could have been hired as a response to the farm labour shortage, the participant said, but that didn’t happen.
Anuik agreed there might be a combination of racism and aboriginal suspicion after decades of broken promises. He said when the Metis Nation in that area developed a community centre called Kapachee to upgrade job and educational skills, the group went from being ignored to acknowledged by the wider society.
“In the 1970s, if you as a Metis person wanted a job, you would wash dishes. The family-owned businesses of the day would not hire aboriginals.”
Even among white organizations, there was a sense of not being valued, Anuik and Williamson said.
The mayor of Wynyard, Sask., insisted that her town is not a bedroom community of a larger city. Rather, she said, it has businesses and industry and should be respected.
In another example, three farm families with 10,000 acres near Dafoe, Sask., formed the Lakeside Machinery Co-operative in 1971. The success that came from pooling their resources led the farmers to build a seed plant and start exporting special crops. However, one of the founders who spoke to Williamson was proud to note that it is a co-op that works like a corporation and is not part of a government agency.
Even the representatives of the Conexus Credit Union noted there is a feeling in the area that credit unions are behind the times.
Yet, Anuik noted, Saskatchewan credit unions introduced automatic teller machines to Canada.
Anuik and Williamson will present their findings at a conference at Princeton University in New Jersey in April.
