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In 2011, Huu‐ay‐aht First Nations became one of five Nuu‐chah‐nulth Nations on the west coast of Vancouver Island in Canada to implement the Maa‐nulth Treaty with the Province of British Columbia and Canada. Modern treaties are dense and lengthy legal documents that exhaustively set out the obligations of each signatory party. They are heavily criticised for being unjust extensions of colonialism that limit Indigenous self‐determination and transform homelands under settler colonial property regimes. Yet, some First Nations accept these agreements as their chosen path for self‐government in state structures. We document Huu‐ay‐aht First Nations' decision‐making that resulted when the Maa‐nulth Treaty was implemented and replaced the Indian Act by analysing the Maa‐nulth Treaty and interviews conducted with Huu‐ay‐aht First Nations leadership. We demonstrate how ʔiisaak (respect) and ʔuuʔałuk (taking care of) guided Huu‐ay‐aht First Nations' self‐government, while nesting this discussion in the complexities and critiques of modern treaties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a nation, Australians celebrate their cultural heritage through purchasing works of art by leading Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists. These works are held in all major State-owned galleries and in most of the private collections of serious art buyers in the country. Australians also champion and support key artistic works in dance and performance. There remains, however, a distinct tension between the willingness of (successive) governments to celebrate the symbolic value of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ creative works and governmental readiness to participate in or endorse any performance that might usher in meaningful structural or material change for First Nations people who, in 2018, are still excluded from the Australian Constitution. The focus of this paper is to consider the performative qualities of both the ‘Uluru Statement from the Heart’ (2017), written by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders and presented to the people of the nation and to the government as an invitation to work together to achieve ‘Constitutional reforms’ for the First Nations people of Australia, and the Government’s response to this invitation via their Media Release and subsequent interviews. An analysis of the modes of address, the language used, and the aesthetic and ethical questions raised by each text, provides insight on the politics of speaking and listening in the current Australian political climate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last five decades, the emergence of a sophisticated and multidimensional set of governance institutions in the predominantly Inuit regions of Canada and the circumpolar north has had a profound impact on the lives of Inuit peoples and the states in which they live. The region of Nunavik in northern Québec has played an important role in the political development of the Canadian and circumpolar Inuit, serving as both an institutional innovator and a key source of leadership at the regional, national, and international levels. Using a multilevel governance framework, this article explores the vertical and horizontal dimensions of Inuit governance in Canada and the circumpolar north. In particular, the article will focus on Nunavik’s contribution to and place in this multidimensional governance structure. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

During the first half of the twentieth century, northern Quebec was under federal jurisdiction. Tired of English Canadian supremacy and increasingly aware of northern Quebec’s considerable natural resources, which could provide a solid basis for future moves toward independence, the Quebec government began to take over responsibility for its northern territories in the 1960s. It established a regional administration to take charge of its northern affairs and sent officers to northern Quebec’s remote communities. For two decades, both governments administered the region and imposed two political systems on the local Inuit. This article is based on lengthy fieldwork and archival research. The historical background is described to show how Nunavik has developed as a political and social entity through its relationships with the Quebec and Canadian governments. This conflictual situation has created tensions in the Inuit community, resulting in political dissensions over the goal of self-government. Finally, this article details how the Inuit have exploited federal–provincial tensions to further their own interests. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Characterized as 'Canada's forgotten people' since their defeat in the 1885 Battle of Batoche, the Métis have recently re-emerged on Canada's policy agenda. How did the Métis, once vilified as traitors of Confederation, come to re-position themselves as a rights-bearing Aboriginal group in the Canadian federation? In this article, we apply John Kingdon's (1995) multiple streams model to help explain the resurgence of Métis rights on Canada's contemporary policy agenda. We argue that the changing legal and political landscape that surrounded Canada's crisis of unity provided a window of opportunity that allowed Métis policy entrepreneurs to bring the issue of Métis rights onto Canada's policy agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Idle No More is a grassroots movement that presents a powerful politics of resistance to settler colonialism. In response, security agencies in Canada have categorized the movement as both a criminal and a national security threat. This article is focused on the policing and surveillance of Idle No More by security agencies in Canada. In detailing the extensive surveillance of the movement, we describe the policing of Idle No More as a continuation of colonial policing practices that target—with the objective of eliminating—indigenous movements that challenge the legitimacy of the settler state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How have municipal governments in Canada been engaging Aboriginal peoples and First Nations? This project examined municipal Aboriginal relations offices and/or advisory committees across Canada and focuses on four cases in Vancouver, Edmonton, Winnipeg and Toronto. This study identified their mandates, size, locations and initiatives these offices and advisory committees have undertaken, which include: awareness training; employment strategies to recruit, hire and retain Aboriginal municipal employees; and improve Aboriginal representation on municipal agencies, boards and commissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Citizens of the Aamjiwnaang First Nation fight for justice with their bodies at the frontlines of daily toxic exposure. This paper examines struggles for environmental and reproductive justice in the polluted heart of Canada’s ‘Chemical Valley’. These are as struggles over life, land and knowledge. Based upon community-engaged qualitative research, from a participatory action research approach, including field immersion, participant observation and 35 in-depth interviews with First Nations residents, I document the Aamjiwnaang First Nation’s citizens’ activities and practices on the ground as they cope with the impact of their contaminated surroundings on their health and habitat. This community-engaged scholarship lens brings into view the lived experiences and ongoing practices of resistance by the Anishinabek citizens who are surrounded by Chemical Valley. I situate these struggles within the green citizenship literature to assess three blind spots of green governmentality: greening citizenship, lifestyle blame and Western dualisms. I discuss the multiple edges of ecological citizenship and argue that citizens are simultaneously bound up within disciplinary power relations and place-based belonging. This place, although polluted, is crucial to practices of relational Anishinabek citizenship and the identity of indigenous citizens who call this place both ‘prison and home’. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines the definition of success in First Nations drinking water service as voiced by the First Nations technical community of practice. The research explores success stories to identify success themes and factors to formulate a workable definition for policy-makers. Researchers interviewed sixteen technical practitioners in Ontario using a semi-structured approach. Data analysis revealed a definition of success that extends beyond the technical boundary to include professional growth, employment, local action and a facilitating policy environment. This comprehensive definition provides a basis for policy and program considerations to increase First Nations buy-in and foster a constructive environment for drinking water improvements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the role of collaborative conservation in the empowerment and autonomy of Canadian First Nations people. The author reflects on the Boreal Leadership Council and the transformation of resistance into strategic accommodation. Other topics include alliances with non-Natives for environmental interests, reaction to the environmental impact of resource extraction, and the development of Native American land-based self-determination.

Objective Natural resource policy has been a constant source of conflict between 'Aboriginal' and 'non-Aboriginal' stakeholders in Canada. We employ a historical institutionalist analysis to examine the extent to which changes to the Canadian Constitution in 1982 and Ontario's Mining Act in 2009 enabled Aboriginal communities to become equal partners in participatory governance arrangements in mineral resource sectors. Methods We analyze primary sources consisting of federal and provincial legislation and in-person interviews conducted across Ontario in 2010. Results The existing Canadian mining policy paradigm, while under significant pressure, has not yet been displaced by a new policy paradigm that would better accommodate the interests of Aboriginal stakeholders. Consequently, Aboriginal peoples' mineral resource claims are likely to remain unresolved. Conclusion We suggest how a policy paradigm that both improves Aboriginal-state relations and reduces uncertainty in the mining sector offers a promising political foundation for participatory governance and cooperative engagement between stakeholders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines ways in which the Crown Duty to Consult is implemented in Ontario planning processes. The authors present the Red Hill Valley Parkway project in Hamilton, Ontario and draw from seventeen semi-structured interviews to examine the role of municipal planning in relation to the duty to consult. The interviews reveal that engaging in municipal-First Nations relations is a mutually beneficial practice, although legislation offers minimal guidance for this practice. In order to move forward planners must confront the challenges and opportunities for municipalities to implement consultation with First Nations in planning processes. The authors conclude that municipal-First Nations engagement will require both legislative change and a cultural shift in how planning is done and what is included in professional planning curricula. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the influence of the Kwakwaka'wakw people of Vancouver Island, British Columbia on anthropologist Franz Boas's ideas about culture. It comments on the arrival of Boas in Kwak'wala land in 1886. The author considers the potlach, a form of indigenous government. The Kwakwaka'wakw principles of circulation, transformation, and unity are explored. Boas' relationship with George Hunt, an Indigenous intellectual and shaman, is considered. The more general issue of the influence of colonized people on colonizers and Western thought is also addressed.

Disagreement over how and between whom power should be shared has led to competing conceptions of federalism in Canada. The model of federalism adopted in the Constitution Act 1867 divides power between the provinces and the federal government to the exclusion of Aboriginal peoples. However, pre-Confederation documents such as the Royal Proclamation of 1763 and the early treaties suggest that federalism is founded on the coexistence of self-governing nations. This paper presents a case study of how one Aboriginal people, the Métis, are reviving the pre-Confederation vision of federalism founded on mutual recognition by carving out a space for themselves in Canada's political and institutional landscape. We argue that by delivering an expanded array of programs and services to their citizens, creating innovative governance structures, adopting legislation in key areas of Métis interest and fostering economic self-sufficiency, the Métis are reshaping federalism from the bottom up. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This essay examines the rebuilding and revitalizing of self-governance capacities in Indigenous communities, and how this is impacting their efficacy in resource management. The origins and experiences in Canada of integrating Indigenous peoples and knowledge into institutionalized resource management are discussed, and the essay posits necessary conditions for full and effective participation in environmental management, arguing that effective self-governance is vital to moving forward on these conditions. Two collaborative processes led by Indigenous peoples will be highlighted as they demonstrate the importance of self-governance initiatives for participation in environmental management processes: the Whitefeather Forest Initiative led by Pikangikum First Nation in Northern Ontario; and the Turning Point Initiative led by the Haida in British Columbia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2004 and 2005, the Supreme Court of Canada handed down a trilogy of decisions that outlined the doctrine of the duty to consult and accommodate, thereby changing how resource development occurs in Aboriginal traditional territories. As a result of these decisions, new avenues of economic development for well-resourced First Nations have opened up, with the hope of creating a new future for remote Aboriginal communities; but are these types of agreements meeting the expectations of First Nations and their members? The authors visited a First Nations community that recently negotiated impact and benefit agreements with large industrial proponents. The authors conducted in-depth, long interviews with 17 key informants: former chiefs and grand chiefs, executive directors of community agencies, program directors, business persons, spiritual persons and elders, property managers, and direct-service practitioners. Five themes, or areas of concern, emerged from the research: unemployment, employment, and economic stimulation; social and physical health concerns; negotiations and meaningful community involvement; corporate social responsibility, capacity building, and social capital; and environmental concerns and cultural relevance. Despite the concerns these agreements raised, 14 of 17 informants remained in favour of the impact and benefit agreements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While academic interest in accountability and transparency mechanisms in Aboriginal governance has risen over the past few years, very few studies have examined how these mechanisms operate in practice. One author, Shin Imai (2007), argues that Indigenous groups in Canada are faced with an accountability paradox that gives too much power to the federal government to intervene in band affairs, while giving too little power to band members to hold their local officials accountable for their actions. This paper examines the extent to which Aboriginal groups can avoid this paradox by reviewing three experiments in institutional design and self-government in Aboriginal communities: the Sechelt Indian Band and the Westbank First Nation in British Columbia, and Nunatsiavut in Labrador. While considerable variation exists in terms of how well these communities overcome Imai's paradox, each community's accountability regime is an improvement over the one imposed by the Indian Act. The effectiveness of these regimes depends heavily on the institutional designs chosen by the Indigenous groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the relationship between the First Nations' right to land use in British Columbia (BC) and their environmental governance of natural resources. A particular focus is given to the First Nations' environmental management of Great Bear Rainforest in BC. An overview of the acquisition of land rights for Aboriginal people in BC, including Canadian Supreme Court decisions, the Great Bear Rainforest Agreements and negotiations between the First Nations' government and the government of BC, is provided. The relationship between the First Nations and land conservation is discussed.

Occasionally in recent decades, relations between the Canadian state and particular Native communities have spiralled into open confrontation and violence. While such instances reflect the failure of conciliatory or decolonizing politics within a liberal–democratic milieu, scholarship has barely begun to analyze these events in a systematic fashion. This article applies to long-standing questions about political behaviour to the study of Native-state relations in Canada. By this, the authors particularly mean the dynamics of Native peoples' mobilization and institutional engagement. Examining several recent cases of open confrontation, this article looks for the basic circumstances in which violence arises, and how confrontation alters internal political dynamics in Native communities. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Indian Act banned women from elected leadership positions in reserve politics in Canada until 1951. This paper locates women in reserve politics and provides an analysis of the First Nations women who served as chiefs and councilors across Canada. Amy Wharton's gender-based Interactionist Approach is used to explore the leaders' unique social and political situation. Does gender make a difference in their experiences as leader? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite a rich and diverse literature on the revitalization of Indigenous legal traditions and constitutional orders, no one has yet looked at modern Aboriginal constitutions in Canada. This essay draws upon the comparative constitutional design and Aboriginal politics literatures to describe and analyze the texts of 14 Aboriginal constitutions. The findings suggest that these constitutional documents are similar to non-Aboriginal ones in many ways. Specifically, both deal with similar political problems and try to express and protect local political cultures. In short, they represent practical attempts to marry Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal constitutional orders and legal traditions in the contemporary context. Students of Aboriginal politics and law should pay greater attention to these documents, and especially to their origins and evolution over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is to analyze the legal concepts and principles that surrounded the colonization of North America as well as the relations that the French had with native Indians. Topics include a comparison between the ideas of French jurist and political philosopher Jean Bodin (1530–1596), about the political aspects of colonization, with those of jurists from the Ancien Regime, a period referring to the history of French society from the 14th to the 18th centuries, a study of official documents from the royal power in Canada at this period, and the arguments of France and Great Britain concerning the negotiating of their possessions in North America.

Abstracts for articles within this issue are presented on topics including homelessness and neoliberalism in the United States, health policies and medical care for prisoners in United State, and the Idle No More grassroots movement among the people of the First Nations in Canada.