Tangled root: The paradoxical development of British Columbia's tree planting industry.

British Columbian tree planters have cultivated a reputation for being countercultural mavericks within the world of forestry. While this standing is well earned in many respects, it also implies that the job is ethically structured in a way that somehow opposes industrial resource extraction like clear-cut logging. Contrary to these perceptions, this study will show how throughout the history of tree planting in B.C. reforestation workers have been given incentive to fulfill the forest industry's mandate to plant trees faster and better, thereby acting as critical participants in maintaining the legitimacy of the modern forest industry. I will show that despite their reputations or personal values, tree planters in British Columbia have also existed - both philosophically and practically - in a symbiotic relationship with intensive harvesting practices. Far from solely being an idealistic social experiment, this prototypical model of a sustainable industry became successful through the displacement of the distinction between binaries like green and corporate, counterculture and capitalist, as well as tree-huggers and loggers. As a result, it is common for contemporary reforestation workers to exude an occupational culture that is bohemian but also maintains a widespread emphasis upon ultra-efficiency, competition, and money-making - traits that have generally intensified over time. --P. ii.