Debating water purity and expertise: the chlorination controversy in Vancouver during the Second World War
| Autor: | Matthew Evenden |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2019 |
| Předmět: |
Archeology
History Government media_common.quotation_subject 05 social sciences Geography Planning and Development World War II 0507 social and economic geography Opposition (politics) Public debate Context (language use) Public administration 16. Peace & justice 6. Clean water Intervention (law) Political science Quality (business) 050703 geography Legitimacy media_common |
| Zdroj: | Journal of Historical Geography. 65:85-95 |
| ISSN: | 0305-7488 |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.jhg.2019.06.007 |
| Popis: | Since its founding in 1886, Vancouver, Canada, has drawn on water supplies from the coastal mountains around the city. City founders and boosters claimed that the water was pure and soft and promoted the quality of the local water as one of the city's defining features. During the Second World War, bacteriological testing identified elevated contamination levels and a major public debate ensued over how to ensure pure water supplies. Regional water managers and civic politicians rejected the evidence as unrelaible and cultivated public opposition to chlorination. The federal government, by contrast, sought to impose water chlorination to ensure public safety and as a war measure. At the heart of the debate lay questions of evidence and truth as well as lay and expert understandings of water purity. While expert opinion disagreed about the best measures of quality and the appropriate regime of treatment, public debate highlighted the mixed views on federal intervention, local control and the legitimacy of science and expertise in the heightened context of wartime. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
| Externí odkaz: |
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