Transcript First Nations politics in Canada Response to Taiaiake Alfred, John Borrows, Alan Cairns, Deborah McGregor, Patrick Macklem, and Fiona MacDonald.

First Nations politics in Canada
Response to Taiaiake Alfred, John
Borrows, Alan Cairns, Deborah
McGregor, Patrick Macklem, and Fiona
MacDonald
Two challenges
1. How to address the historical fact of
colonialism and severe injustice directed
toward First Nations people by the Canadian
state
2. How to reconcile First Nations political
philosophy and political claims with the
liberal assumptions at the foundation of the
modern Canadian state
Reading FN politics as liberals
• To a large degree, the Canadian system of government is
based on liberal assumptions:
– Individuals are bearers of rights
– Insofar as group rights are important, it is because individuals
choose to make them important
– The state should treat all individuals equally under the law
– The state exists to enforce cooperation, but should not infringe
on the legitimate freedoms of individuals
• Many of the assigned readings take a much more
communitarian view
• What is meant by ‘culture’? And who decides what it involves or
requires? –Macklem discusses this, Taiaiake asserts importance
of ‘traditional values’ but largely doesn’t define them
• How do you decide who is part of the community?
1 - Injustices
1. Injustice in the initial form of contact
between Europeans and First Nations
peoples, including the unjust seizure of land
2. Unjust treatment of First Nations people by
the state
3. Enduring structures that embody
discrimination and cause harm
Taiaiake Alfred
• “All land claims in Canada, including those at
issue in the BC treaty process, arise from the
mistaken premise that Canada owns the land it is
situated on. In fact, where indigenous people
have not surrendered ownership, legal title to
“Crown” land does not exist – it is a fiction of
Canadian (colonial) law. To assert the validity of
Crown title to land that the indigenous
population has not surrendered by treaty is to
accept the racist assumptions of earlier
centuries.”
Subsequent injustices
• Cairns on some special topics considered by
the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples:
– Residential schools
– Relocation of Aboriginal communities
– Inequitable treatment of veterans
– Cultural aggression of the Indian Act
• To this we could add: breach of promises,
perpetuation of cycles of poverty and
dependence, and more
Enduring structures that embody
discrimination and cause harm
• Arguably includes the Indian Act, reservation system,
division of responsibility for First Nations people
between levels of government, court decisions, etc
• Royal Commission:
– “Aboriginal people are over-represented among clients of
remedial services such as health care, social services and
the justice system (policing, courts and jails)”
– “High and rising rates of poverty and unemployment
increase the need for welfare, housing subsidies and other
payments to individuals”
Summary: injustice
• What is the contemporary relevance of the injustices
that occurred during the initial period of contact
between First Nations people and European
colonialists?
• Likewise, of subsequent harmful policies and programs
that have since been discontinued
• Finally, of contemporary institutions and practices that
are arguably harmful or otherwise inappropriate
• What needs to be changed now to end ongoing
injustice, and what ought to be done about the
injustices of the past?
2 - Political philosophy
• Questions raised
• Basis for the authority of First Nations
governments
• First Nations governance in the Canadian and
global context
These readings raise major issues of
political philosophy
• On what basis is land legitimately owned?
• On what legitimate basis can a body exercise
power and control over individuals, or over
subsidiary groups?
• To what degree and in what way must
reparation be made for past injustices?
• What is the nature of the good life, and what
political structures help to bring it about?
Authority of First Nations governments
• A question of both source and justification
• Utilitarian? –First Nations governments would
do a better job
• Alternative – historically based legitimacy
• How do we reconcile a state structure
predicated on the power of the provincial and
federal governments over individuals with
claims about group rights?
Canadian and global context
• How should the state legislate in relations to
groups that it has historically oppressed?
– Be interventionist and try to right historical wrongs?
– Be non-interventionist in recognition of past
incompetence and colonialism
• If so, who governs?
• Viability of First Nation governments in a
globalized world
– Cairns: largely groups of 5,000 to 7,000 people
– Capable of effectively addressing issues of
interdependence on larger scales: trade, migration,
environment, etc?
Summary: political philosophy
• First Nations political philosophy – insofar as it
can be considered unified – cannot easily be
made compatible with an order based around
liberal states
• Similarly, the appropriate response to past
injustices is not clear – particularly given how
efforts at correcting past errors may
themselves perpetuate colonialism