Taking the road less travelled: indigenous self-determination and participation in Canadian institutions

Despite ever-increasing pressure for Indigenous self-determination, Canadian society continues to resist its implications. Describing the conflict as a clash of two fundamentally incompatible paradigms, I create a framework that sheds light on the inner workings of paradigmatic political change. With the goal of self-determination clearly at the centre, this article studies whether such a direct constitutional challenge can be supplemented by indirect approaches. Two types of indirect approaches are considered: self-government approaches that (temporarily) accept elements of the existing constitutional paradigm and institutional approaches that see Indigenous peoples (temporarily) working within existing rules and institutions. Rejecting the former outright in the case of Indigenous peoples in Canada, I apply analogous principles from chemistry to help assess the qualities institutional approaches must have to be considered effective political catalysts. In particular, any successful political catalyst must not compromise self-determination’s goals and must hasten the process through a series of more attainable intermediate changes. Institutional approaches must also meet a third criterion, which speaks to establishing Indigenous security and trust in the ability of institutional approaches to bring about self-determination. With these criteria in hand, I suggest that introducing guaranteed Indigenous representation and Indigenizing legislatures can work together as political catalysts that hasten self-determination in ways that Indigenous peoples feel secure pursuing

Between Shared Identity and Shared Fate: In Search of a Just Multinational Citizenship for Canada

Contemporary theories of multinational citizenship in Canada often struggle to have universal appeal. Theories that promote a shared identity appeal to the Canadian majority but often push Indigenous peoples away. Similarly, theories that suggest that Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples simply need to respect one another and get on with business in a more just way fail to offer convincing accounts of how this state of affairs will come into existence. In other words, such theories have little appeal for the more numerous and therefore more powerful non-Indigenous majority upon whose success such proposals depend. This article contends that greater consideration for the psychological dimension of citizenship offers a better starting point for building a sense of solidarity between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples, promoting citizenship based on a thinner mutual identification with shared Canadian institutions. It does so by primarily considering the importance of symbolic transformation within shared institutions. The conclusion suggests that citizenship based on mutual identification offers a better starting point. However, greater consideration of the relationship between justice and power is needed to realize more just forms of multinational justice in cases of significant national power imbalances leading to the domination of one group by another.status: publishe

Nationalism, Cosmopolitanism, and Social Justice in Multinational Contexts

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Helots, Spartans and Contemporary Wars Within

peerreview_statement: The publishing and review policy for this title is described in its Aims & Scope. aims_and_scope_url: http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?show=aimsScope&journalCode=cper20status: publishe

Indra Overland and Mikkel Berg-Nordlie, Bridging Divides: Ethno-political Leadership Among the Russian Sámi

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Decolonizing Canadian Citizenship: Shared Belonging, Not Shared Identity

Contemporary theories of decolonial citizenship struggle to have universal appeal. In the Canadian context, two types of theories dominate within the literature. On the one hand, there are theories that promote a shared identity. These appeal to the settler majority but often push Indigenous peoples away. On the other hand, theories that suggest that Indigenous peoples and settlers simply need to respect one another and get on with business in a more just way fail to offer convincing accounts of how this state of affairs will come into existence. In other words, such theories have little appeal for the more numerous and more powerful settler population upon whose success such proposals depend. This article considers two insufficient prominent expressions of the two perspectives by, respectively, Alan C. Cairns and Melissa S. Williams. In so doing, it is suggested that greater consideration for the psychological dimension of citizenship offers a better starting point for building a sense of common purpose and shared belonging between Indigenous and settler peoples, promoting a thinner mutual identification with shared Canadian institutions.status: publishe

Power, Justice, and National Culture in an Expanding European Union: An Unjust Dilemma for Potential Member States

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Cosmopolitanism, Nationalism, and Social Justice in Multinational Contexts

Tension in mainstream debates between cosmopolitans and liberal nationalists is not only overstated, but also overlooks richer possibilities for promoting social justice beyond national borders. Tan (2004) suggests liberal nationalists correctly support national cultures as vital for individual freedom, but arbitrarily limit cosmopolitanism to simply humananitarian aid. Because scarce resources are unfairly distributed, national power imbalances jeaopardizes the national security of some. Economic redistribution between national groups must follow according to a global Rawlsian basic structure that maximizes the situation of the worst off. Yet, Tan hastilly adopts liberal nationalism. He inherits its narrow understanding of national protection based on cultural difference. In demanding economic redistribution, Tan fails to question existing state structures and even less to question the dominant global economic paradigm. This is both normatively and practically problematic for pushing social justice beyond national borders. Normatively, cosmopolitan liberalism overlooks nationalism’s political and economic dimensions. Like liberal nationalists, Tan seeks to protect cultural difference and not political difference. “Cultural” groups are often not seeking to preserve their difference inasmuch as they wish to enjoy the same self-determination enjoyed by nation-states. This is based on more fundamental democratic claims to “determine its own future as free as possible from external interference or domination by another nation or collection of nations” (Murphy 2001: 374). The onus shifts onto liberal nationalists to defend the power of existing states. Consistency demands that they must provide equal access to self-determination as a national political-democratic right as opposed to the much more limited cultural-preservation right. The opposite would be akin to Canada and the United States merging because of cultural convergence. Liberal nationalists overestimate the separateness of culture and economic spheres. Cosmopolitan liberals lack a normative space for economic pluralism that allows weaker national communities the protection they need to pursue economic activities vital for national survival. Though it is a fact that globalization has seen a global economic regime emerge that is difficult to resist or hide from, for many the idea of national recognition also involves – at least initially – protection from the assimilatory forces that come from external economic pressures. This seems contrary to Tan, who believes economic redistribution allows national groups to compete fairly in global markets. Such a view seems like economic assimilation – a scary fact for national groups whose culture has little in common with the dominant global economic paradigm. Supporting political and economic dimensions is a necessary precondition for realizing global justice. This need not entail tolerance for nonliberal regimes, nor does it lead to conservative cosmopolitanism. It simply suggests that social justice requires recognizing greater national pluralism as a first step toward promoting richer, meaningful, and therefore lasting forms of cosmopolitan redistribution. It allows for greater convergence than those that only allow for special rights based on the preservation of cultural differences.status: publishe

On The Meaning of Renewing the Relationship between the Dutch and Haudenosaunee Peoples: The Two Row Wampum Treaty After 400 Years

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The “Idle No More” movement and global indifference to Indigenous nationalism

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