The Creation of Radicalism: Anti-Nuclear Activism in Nova Scotia, c. 1972–1979

Abstract

Abstract: An attempt to build the world's largest nuclear power plant on a tiny island off the south shore of Nova Scotia in the early 1970s sparked an anti-nuclear movement that was able, by the end of the decade, to force the provincial government to abandon plans for a united regional electric utility. The provincial movement shared in the creation of national, continental, and even global campaigns against nuclear technology but was fractious within itself. Bringing together peace activists, feminists, counterculture back-to-the-landers, along with classic conservationists, engineers, and fishers' advocates, the anti-nuclear coalition faced inevitable internal disagreement. By the late 1970s, different approaches to government and industry – as partners or as adversaries – had produced a nascent environmental mainstream, and by extension a radical fringe, from activist groups and networks that had achieved success by working together in prior years. The anti-nuclear controversy of the 1970s was key to the shape of the environmental movement in decades to follow.