ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the emerging role of two NGOs in food governance processes in Canada’s Northwest Territories: the Yellowknife Food Charter Coalition, which works on food security issues within the city of Yellowknife; and Ecology North, an NGO working on food systems issues at the territorial level. It unpacks the elements that allow for NGOs to have an influence in food systems governance. It also assesses where these NGOs’ growing influence is situated on the governance continuum presented in Chapter 1 of this volume, as well as if it is resulting in the collaborative governance (or co-governance) role which these NGOs seek. Our analysis shows that these NGOs are effective at combining new frames, coalition-building, and working synergistically on policy and community initiatives. However, the political opportunity structure has some constraints. It seems particularly open to a municipal agricultural policy, but no evidence yet that the municipality will think of a food strategy in more comprehensive, systemic, terms. At the territorial level, Ecology North is moving into the coalition-building phase with its territorial network, hoping to have a growing impact. At this level, the political opportunity structure is open from the point of view of there being lots of space within the Northwest Territories to influence certain policies (again, especially agriculture), but that structure may also impose constraints as other areas relevant to food, hunting, and resource management are already heavily governed by a range of invested actors. We also draw on Emerson et al’s (2011) work on the dynamics of co-governance, which proposes that in practice it involves certain types of key drivers, quality principled engagement, shared motivation, and a shared capacity for joint action. Looking for these qualities in the two NGOs’ engagement with food governance in Yellowknife and the Northwest Territories leads us to identify some opportunities for co-governance to emerge. However, greater engagement and trust-building among key actors must occur first.
