The flush of a toilet is routine. It is safe, efficient, necessary, nonpolitical, and utterly unremarkable. Yet Jamie Benidickson’s examination of the social and legal history of sewage in Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom demonstrates that the uncontroversial reputation of flushing is deceptive. The Culture of Flushing investigates and clarifies the murky evolution of waste treatment. It is particularly relevant in a time when community water quality can no longer be taken for granted.

Jamie Benidickson is a professor at the Faculty of Law, Common Law Section, University of Ottawa, where he teaches Environmental Law, administrative law, water law, and legal history. His publications in these areas include Environmental Law, Third Edition (Irwin Law, 2008); The Culture of Flushing: A Social and Legal History of Sewage (UBC Press, 2007); Getting the Green Light: Environmental Regulation and Investment in Canada (C.D. Howe Institute, 1994); and an issues paper for the Walkerton Inquiry, "The Development of Water Supply and Sewage Infrastructure in Ontario, 1880–1990s: Legal and Institutional Aspects of Public Health and Environmental History" (Toronto, 2002). He is also the author of Idleness Water and A Canoe: Reflections on Paddling for Pleasure (University of Toronto Press, 1997) and The Temagami Experience: Recreation, Resources and Aboriginal Rights in the Northern Ontario Wilderness (University of Toronto Press, 1989).

In 2004, Jamie was appointed director of the IUCN Academy of Environmental Law.

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