In the “developed” world, with slow-growing, stable or even slightly declining native populations, sprawl is mostly driven by immigration. In Africa and South America, sprawl is driven by still growing domestic populations and migration from rural to urban areas. In China, the construction of immense blocks of large apartment buildings is being driven by the flow of people from the countryside into the cities. This is a shift from rural to urban centres as the population of China is at or near its peak.

Because of the obvious damage sprawl is doing to the land and the lives of citizens, a great many protest groups have sprung up to oppose it. These may be focused on wetlands, farmland, gravel pits, access to nature, affordable housing and taxes but they all have one thing in common; sprawl is hurting their vital interests. They want governments to get back into the business of responsible governance rather than just taking orders from developers, speculators and debt mongers.

Below is a list of groups opposed to sprawl. This is an initial list only and very much a work in progress. Please supply the names and contact info for any groups you know of, anywhere in the world and we will post it as quickly as possible. You can reach us at info@sustainablesociety.com. There is a list of useful resources – cartoons, placard and bumper sticker slogans and research papers in the Reference section of this page.

Most established politicians have gone through the media filter and are pro-growth and have not given any consideration to how social progress and environmental sustainability can be achieved. They have no strategy for progress and their only policy is “bigger is better”. While in the past most politicians have conflated growth with progress, this may be changing. To help this transition along the best thing a voter can do is find a candidate who is proactive and anti-sprawl and fully support them! And let the other candidates know why.

How do you do this? By asking questions such as:

1. Are you in favour of building on farmland and forests? If not, where do you see growth stopping if ever?
2. What do you think is in the best interests of your constituents, a bigger town or a better town?
3. Do you have a strategy in place to achieve energy sustainability? Food security?
4. How does a growing population impact Canada’s carbon emissions? (hint: The carbon footprint of the current immigrant stream increases by a factor of 4:1 when they come to Canada. For some regions it can be 15:1. This is also a disaster for the globe. The Challenge – please tell us if, globally, you can think of a more environmentally destructive policy than mass migration from regions of low carbon emissions to regions of high carbon emissions.)