Many readers of IN-SIGHTS examine public issues with great care and email private comments to me along with links to worthwhile material. What follows comes from a paper forwarded by North Van’s Grumps, fellow blogger at Blog Borg Collective. The complete paper shown below is authored by the late Dr. Karen Bakker of UBC1 and Richard Hendriks from University of Toronto’s Civil and Mineral Engineering faculty. Below the separator is an excerpt selected by NVG.
…The Site C Project is an example of what Boelens, Shah and Bruins term in the introductory article to this special issue as “manufactured ignorance” via the exclusion of specific questions, analyses, data, and analytical methods from consideration.
In the case of Site C, this “manufactured ignorance” was criticized by a wide range of stakeholders, including affected Indigenous communities, a previous CEO of BC Hydro, the former Chair of the Joint Review Panel (a former senior federal civil servant), and a federal government department.
Of course, this contestation of knowledge occurs in the context of uncertainties and unpredictability of planning mega-projects such as large dams, which inevitably understates the challenges and difficulties which arise in such projects. It is also important to emphasize the point made above that Indigenous treaty rights issues, while beyond the scope of this paper, are significant in the context of Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and its recent commitment to implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous peoples.
Nonetheless, our analysis reveals that the choices made by the government and BC Hydro regarding the evaluation of cumulative effects and GHG emissions favored a specific outcome: developing the Site C Project.
The question thus arises: what forms of regulatory review could reduce the possibility for “manufacturing ignorance” in the future? How might legal, policy, and procedural changes create the space for more accurate, comprehensive, and inclusive evaluation?
Our hope is that our analysis of the Site C case provides lessons for the future on these crucially important questions.
1 Please follow the link above for further information about Dr. Bakker. She had an extraordinary academic career.
in-sights.ca 
You are correctly describing the process in fashion in the world today. Here in BC we are participating in the process of wealth concentration just like everywhere else. Thomas Piketty identified this process at the start of this century but the 1 % , and those employed by them, mostly ditched the concerns Thomas and fellow travelers were worrying about, like unfairness.
A good description of the sinister process is given by John Perkins in his two books, “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man” and “The New Confessions of an Economic Hitman”.
After a few attempts to work as a professional economist (hitman) I decided to do other work for a living rather than act as “Front Man” for those expecting me to lie for them. Andrew Haldane of the Bank of England was a good example of fronting for his Governor, Mark Carney.
A quick examination of what are the national central bank rates is a good indication of how the process of wealth concentration has delivered to their respective populations. Try Argentina at 100% recently.
Erik
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Try Transit! Manufactured ignorance runs planning, rules TransLink and the provincial government.
We are spending now, well over $11 billion to build 21.7 km, extending the Expo and Millennium Lines. Not quite site C, but on a scale, much worse.
The Expo and Millennium Lines operate the now obsolete Movia Automatic Light metro system. This now obsolete, proprietary light metro system has had four owners and at least six rebrandings.
The system was obsolete before the Expo Line opened in Vancouver, but a crass politcal deal between the provincial government of Ontario and the former Social Credit government in BC. In short the unsalable ICTS system, was rebranded ALRT for the sale to Vancouver.
This fooled no one internationally, but the media and the locals was a different story.
by the time bombardier bought the system, they found it so badly designed and built they rebuilt the system completely using their Innovia body-shells, but still no one wanted it.
The SNC_Lavalin scandal was started with Bombardier (owned technical patents) and SNC Lavalin (owned engineering patents) paid “success fees” to senior bureaucrats and politicians (including the the ten Prime Minister) in Malaysia to build with it.
Only for were built, with the stench of scandal behind every one.
But the NDP flip flipped from light rail to ART (the fourth rebranding) for the millennium Line.
There has been no sales since 2004 and TransLink remains the only customer extending the system.
Easily the taxpayer has paid three times more for our present light metro system, than it should or put another way, the taxpayer has spent a minimum of $20 billion more (including all the hidden subsidies), for a proprietary light metro system, which is essentially, a museum piece.
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